Heather's Lament
by HeatherSuoh
Summary: [COMPLETE] After the end of World Tour, Heather keeps a diary to help her cope with her memories and feelings. -ℋ
1. Part 1

_**Alternatively titled:**_

 _ **Excerpts from Heather's Diary**_

 **May 20th, 2011**

Okay. Let's dive into this before I lose nerve.

It's been 26 days. Four shy of a month.

Twenty six days ago, I came home from Total Drama World Tour on a train. A really nice train. It was dreamlike, not being on a death trap. I probably would've been, if Miss psycho-crazy hadn't blown the plane up in the bottom four. But, she did, so I was on a train by myself.

Or at least I ended up by myself. At first I was placed on the same train as Noah, because we were going the same direction.

We didn't sit by each other, which felt weird. We just sat in separate rows like complete strangers, which.. I guess we damn near were. It was so surreal. That game had been my entire world for years, and now it was over. I would probably see none of those people ever again. This wasn't like the end of season 2. I wouldn't hear from Gwen over the internet, or see Katie and Sadie in the tabloids.

No. It wasn't like the end of season 2 at all. This season hadn't ended on a widely broadcasted talk show with cheesy questionnaires and merchandise being sold off the edge of stage right. This season hadn't ended with a live audience holding up _"I love Trent"_ and _"Marry me Justin!"_ signs.

This season ended with calamity. Injury. Disaster. And certainly not any cheesy tabloid fame. We didn't have to fend off photographers getting onto the train.

The only thing I had to fend off was the panic squeezing my chest to a lifeless pulp.

We got our stuff back, which was also really weird. Noah was wearing different clothes, which made him look jarringly like a real person. His nose was shoved in a book, earphones jammed into his ears.

I was bundled up for winter even though it was perfectly warm outside, and even more stuffy on the train. I'd been breaking out in cold sweats since the finale. When the train started moving and the station we'd pulled from faded out of view, it really started to sink in that I'd never see any of those people ever again.

My last glimpse of anyone from that show would be Noah packing his book into his bag and switching trains, without so much as a passing glance towards me.

Was he not shaken up by the events of the finale?

I guess it makes sense that he wouldn't be. He didn't spend nearly as much time in the game as me, in any season. Was he even in season two? I couldn't remember. He never built any strong emotional connections to anyone in the cast. Not even secretly; One sidedly.

My stomach turned and I started to shake in my seat, knees held tightly to my chest. Rain fell steadily on the top of the train, hard like tiny little hammers beating at the back of my head. A headache was coming on; the dull sort of ache behind your eyes you get from crying too hard. But I hadn't cried. Not yet.

I started to think about all of the people I was going to miss, and how none of them would ever know that I missed them. I thought about every one-sided attachment I had, how many people I liked-even loved-that hated me, because I treated them like mud on the bottom of my shoes.

But that was the only way I knew how to treat people. The more affection I have for a person, the harder I shove them away. And I just.. expect them to understand that.

But of course no one did. That mentality didn't-doesn't-make any sense at all.

The only one who seemed to understand my roundabout way of affection was Alejandro. But even he had his limits of what he was willing to understand, and I… in his own words, always pushed too far.

Too far.

I didn't want him out of my life forever. I was _so scared_ that he'd leave my life forever.

So I shoved him away, literally. Just to leave him before he could leave me. So it would hurt less.

In the end, I'm not really sure that worked out.

I tried to keep myself together for as long as possible. And I did. When the train rolled to it's first stop and Noah stood up to switch trains, I burst into tears knowing it was the last time I would ever see any of them in person again. I tried to be quiet and hide my shuddering, but he noticed. He was being ushered out of the train by the crowd of others trying to leave, but for a moment, our eyes met. And he looked surprised. Confused. Maybe even concerned.

My eyes were bright red and spilling over with tears when he looked at me. He said my name, with a lingering question mark at the end of it. Maybe he never even noticed I'd been in the next row over until then.

Our gaze was broken when he was pushed forward out of the train, and I never saw him again.

-ℋ

 **May 23rd, 2011**

It has been 28 days. Two shy of a month.

My therapist is nerdy in a way that reminds me of Chris's interns. But as far as people I've actually spent time with, he's pretty much the opposite of any man that's ever been in my life. He's not very masculine, like my dad, or Alejandro. He's not exactly un-masculine either, though. He's not girly. Just… A bit of a dweeb.

He's serious and to-the-point in a way that intimidates me a little. He reminds me of Alejandro because he doesn't take my crap. He calls me out when I'm beating around the bush, and I'm not really comfortable with that.

I'm really fucking glad this whole journal idea was brought up, because now that I have it, he's content with me writing for the entire hour instead of talking. That makes me a lot less unnerved.

I clutched the book in my hands; about the same dimensions of a notebook, but much thicker. My parents had spared no expense (Do they ever?) and gotten me something really nice; Pink moleskine with a green ribbon sprouting from the binding.

"Something to show me?" he asked, before even saying hello. I nodded and sat it slowly down on the table. He flipped it open, handling it with much less care than I had. But his expression changed; he looked very impressed with me that I had written something sensical, and it was even longer than a sentence or two. I had exceeded his expectations.

I felt very reassured when he praised me, but I'm not sure why. I remembered then that at first my mom had wanted to send me to a female therapist, and I asked she reassign me-Female relationships have never been easy for me. I mean, _all_ relationships have never been easy for me-but anyone I've ever been remotely close to before was a man. They seemed to relate to me easier. Maybe it's because men are known to show emotion less than women. That wasn't particularly true of Dr. Kenwar though. His emotions were usually on his sleeve, which I thought was weird for a therapist.

He skimmed the pages for a moment before closing the book and sliding it towards me, and I felt a hint of remorse for the material of the back of the book that was being skidded across the (probably) germy table.

"Did it help?"

I opened my mouth to respond to the question, but it was harder to answer than I thought. I pondered it for a second. Then, "Yeah. I think so."

"Write more then." he said, and the momentary interest in his eyes was gone. He seemed preoccupied, all the time.

I shrugged, picking the book up again and flipping it to a blank page. "Write about what?"

Then he gave me a prompt.

" _My most emotional memory from World Tour."_

That topic is a bit multifaceted. It could be taken a few different ways and probably over-analyzed too, but that's time wasting. (Wouldn't want to waste my precious time on Dr. Kenwars shitty 90's housewife chair cushions, right?) But I'm allowed to interpret it however I want, I guess, I mean, this is _my_ writing and all. I feel like the _correct_ answer to this question is "I'm so fucking pissed about the fact that I didn't get my money that every second of my existence is a swirling shitstorm of hell." But… That wasn't the first thing that came to my head when I heard the prompt. So that's not what I'll write about this time.

It was 28 days ago, two days shy of a month.

There were tears in the corners of my eyes, but the heat rising around me made my red eyes excusable.

I specifically remember the bitterness in Alejandro's voice when he said, "I truly hope you'll live to see me win."

He'd just screamed at me a minute ago, for a slip of the tongue. I replied "Wow, uh, testy much?" or something to that effect. Translation: What did I do wrong now?

I was beginning to come apart at the seams. I could feel it, and it was scary, because there were cameras, and other contestants. I was balanced poorly on a slab of rock, lava bubbling around my feet. I leaned forward and gripped onto the steel bars. Cody had just dropped a trap on me instead of Alejandro, letting him get the lead. He was already part way up the volcano ahead of me.

" _Come on, Heather! Are you just going to let him win a million bucks?_

 _Don't give up or the bad guy wins!"_ __

I always sort of appreciated Cody. In fact, I liked him enough to leave him alone for three years. But right then, I could've hugged him-if I'd had the time.

But I didn't. I had a race to win.

I was the _good guy._ Me.

I could've broken down and cried over the sentiment-that someone, _anyone,_ was insinuating that I wasn't perpetually the worst person in the room. In any room.

But I didn't stop to cry. _I had a race to win._

I slammed into the cage to knock it onto its side, my legs being badly singed in the process. Remnants of those burns can still be found, but they didn't stop me then. I was out and running before I'd even realized I was hurt, oversized wooden dummy held clumsily in my hands. I charged forward with the sort of inspiration I had never felt before in my life…

Because I was the good guy. The underdog. The one people were rooting for. I had people _rooting_ for me!

There were real, actual people who actually wanted to see me _succeed._

I had a support team. Two people that wanted, even in a roundabout way, to see me be happy.

I didn't mind the roundabout way. Roundabout affection has been the only affection I've ever recieved; The only affection I've ever given.

I was thinking about my support team when I charged up the ledge.

Cody and Harold, but mostly Cody. I could hear the words repeating in my head again and again.

 _Don't give up or the bad guy wins._

He was the first person to ever tell me he believed in me, even if it wasn't in those words.

-ℋ

 **May 25th, 2011**

As of today, it's been an entire month since I came home from Total Drama.

A month since Alejandro kissed me.

I keep glancing over the faded burns on my legs and wondering if his are this much better already. I hope they are, it would make me happy-or at least less guilty-to know he recovered fast. Maybe things really weren't that bad! Maybe he's home in Spain with his brother(s?) and Jose is picking on him for being bald, and hitting him in the arm and calling him Al. And it hurts worse now, to be hit there, because he's burned, but he just rolls his eyes and smiles a little bit because he knows that he's home now and never, ever has to see me again.

A month feels like way too short of a time period.

I feel like I left that show months and months and months ago now, it's so distant and untouchable.

At the same time, a month feels incredibly long. I feel like it ended yesterday. I can still hear Alejandro's voice like he's right beside me; I still shoot up in bed in the mornings with the thought, "Shit, I'm late for the challenge, aren't I!"

It's a Wednesday, so, no therapy today.

I'm writing today because I don't have anything better to do. Other than lay here wrapped in my blankets and watching reruns on TV, anyway, and I've done a lot of that lately. Probably too much.

They've been airing old season two episodes at like three in the morning. They make me laugh a lot but I'm also yet to get through one without feeling kind of like my heart is being ripped straight from my chest.

I was really transparent in season 2. Like, a lot more than I really remember being. I guess that's stupidly obvious-Of course at the time I thought I was being all tough and strong. It's just kind of blindsiding to see how wrong I was from an outsider point of view.

I thought the fact that I enjoyed the majority of my fellow contestants and wanted love and validation was so much… better concealed. But it wasn't. Especially in that Aftermath episode I'm too lazy to look up the name of. The one right after I was eliminated.

As of that episode, if not even sooner, it had to have been so glaringly obvious that I was nothing but a vulnerable little child hiding behind a cardboard cut out. None of them budged.

I don't even know how to put that feeling into words.

That they all knew they could break through to me if they wanted to, but they just didn't care enough to want to.

Nobody was actually willing to put any work in towards understanding me.

Nobody that season, at least.

...

I fucking hate Alejandro. I hope he's dead along with every vulnerable memory he has of me.

-ℋ

 **May 26th, 2011**

I want to go back I want to go back I want to go back I want to go back I want to go back I want to go back I want to go…

-ℋ


	2. Part 2

**June 1st, 2011**

There was cotton in my mouth and I was pretty much slobbering everywhere, still a little loopy post-surgery. It was totally gross, but I was determined. I slammed my hand down on the counter, then slowly opened my palm. A (for the most part) unscathed golden tooth rolled quietly from it and hit the surface with a tiny ping.

" _THISTH. TELL ME WHAT THISTH ISTH WORSTH."_

"... Excuse me, Ma'am?"

My dad placed an authoritative hand on my shoulder. "We wish to pawn this, for whatever we can get for it."

" _WHAEVA WE CA GETH? NO! I WANSTH A FA'A PRICE! I'LL GET MA' LEGA OFFICIALS INVOL-"_

"Heather. You're going to hurt yourself. Turn off."

I pouted,as well as I could with a swollen mouth and a ball of cotton preventing me from fully closing my lips. My dad sighed and smiled; A wide, intimidating smile that I proudly inherited from him.

"Her oral surgeon informs us that this is legitimate. We're here to pawn it."

The old man behind the counter slowly picked up the morsel and inspected it, a wheezy laugh whistling through his throat. "Well, I can't exactly just take your word on that-or your oral surgeon, for that matter." He laughed again, and I rolled my eyes hard.

"WATSTH IT WORSTH?"

"Well… Assumin' that it _is_ genuine, you could probably get between $550 to $600 for it."

"YESTH!"

Okay, so it wasn't a million bucks. Not even close. But squeezing even a small amount out of that show, even inadvertently, felt like a win.

Besides, absolutely no part of me expected the gold from those amazonian actor boys to be _genuine!_ I was already excited to get whatever disgrossting imitation crap that was _out of my mouth._ But… Genuine gold?

I had a huge, malevolent smile on my face in the car-Another expression I shared with my dad. He had an evil streak in him. (It was me.)

Omitting cotton-related speech impediments: "Five hundred and forty, five hundred and sixty, five hundred and eighty…"

My dad's eyes were on the road. "Whatcha gonna spend it on, you heathen?"

A loving nickname. More often, _'Godless Heathen.'_ My mom's never been a huge fan of it, but _I've_ always thought it was hilarious.

"Five hundred and ninety nine dollar-goldfish."

He laughed, and he seemed legitimately happy, the creases around his mouth appearing when he smiled. That's how you can tell a real smile from a fake one. Err.. In people over forty. That's probably what I missed most about my dad-He got my jokes.

"What about the last dollar?"

"Savings!"

He laughed again and for a second I remembered what it felt like to hang out with him every day, back before Total Drama started.

"You could use it to fly out and see your boyfriend."

I was completely blindsided. It was like he reached out and slapped me.

"Fly out and do _what!?"_

"Oh come on. What was his name? Al?"

I felt like the entire world just froze, myself included. "Alejandro." I corrected, movements mechanical. I stared out the window and felt very isolated.

"I know you think he's not going to forgive you. But… Contributing to the hospitalization bills could be a decent gesture. One you could do without talking, no less."

My mind didn't want to process those words. Why did my dad think he knew what he was talking about?

Why was he always right about me?

I stayed silent.

-ℋ

 **June 3rd, 2011**

Prompt: Fear

Yet another horribly vague prompt. This one is actually even vaguer. I'm going to roll with the punches the same way I did last time Dr. Kenwar gave me a crap prompt, and go with the first thing that came to mind. Vulnerability.

Have I mentioned how much I hate feeling vulnerable? Because feeling vulnerable is the worst kind of torture, and this is coming from someone who survived three years on Total Drama _and_ had my head shaved.

It's worth mentioning straight off though that _feeling_ vulnerable and _being_ vulnerable are two completely different things. And usually, people that _are_ vulnerable, don't feel it. And people who aren't just deal with the crippling fear of being perceived that way.

It's like… How do I put this.

It's like you're a product.

You are a product that needs to be sold, but you've got no marketing team or anything. You're expected to sell yourself.

And you want to act like you're way too cool for that. Like, you totally don't _want_ anybody to buy you. Even though you do. But acting like you don't want to be bought sort of makes people _want_ to buy you in theory, because of the "forbidden fruit" thing, or whatever.

And so you just go by this system of "fake it till you make it", and even though you don't think you belong there, you stomp straight into the most expensive and well regarded store there is and set yourself up on a pedestal. And then you slap a price tag on yourself that's got six zeros on the end of it, and no decimal points. And you cross your arms and scowl, and glare at everyone at the store like you'll hurt them if they even _think_ about making an offer.

And then something totally crazy happens.

Nobody wants to buy you.

Nobody even glances in your general direction.

And you start to get scared. So you get meaner and ruder and you frown harder, try to make it seem more like you _belong_ in the super expensive too-good-for-anyone store. But it doesn't change anything.

You're hit with the horrible realization that pretending really hard doesn't make something true-Surely, everyone else can see through your charade, right? **You were a polished piece of trash, sitting among diamonds and just** _ **pretending**_ **you were one of them.** And they knew all along, when you thought you were fooling them! How EMBARRASSING!

So at this point in the game, you've got two options.

The first one is to admit to yourself that you were wrong… And slowly climb down the ladder.

Mark down your price. Five zeros. Four. Three.

You get embarrassed of the pedestal you built for such an unworthy product, and you move to the floor. You smile modestly. "FOR SALE! SHORT TIME ONLY!"

When people still don't consider buying what you have to offer, you move down another rung or two.

You leave the fancy, expensive store and try to sell yourself for a buck at the dollar store, you try to always smile.

And it keeps down spiraling more and more and more…

Until eventually you are on the side of the street with a cardboard sign, tears down your cheeks yelling "FREE! _PLEASE_ TAKE ME! I'LL DO ANYTHING! PLEASE, GOD, _SOMEBODY_ TAKE ME!"

…

Or, maybe that option is your worst fucking fear. And you're not ready to face that bitter truth yet.

So you take the second option.

And you don't lower your price.

You stay right where you were at the top of the pedestal in the fancy expensive store and the 6-zero price tag. In fact, you add another two.

Your frown grows more relentless.

If you act hard enough, they _have_ to believe you.

And so you stay in that cycle forever and ever, refusing to outwardly accept the fact that nobody wants you.

…

You can't stand the idea of turning into that desperate figure on the side of the street.

And at this point, the idea of lowering your standards even a _tiny_ bit feels like the equivalent of being that person.

So you don't budge.

that was kind of more depressing than I meant it to be.

-ℋ

 **June 4th, 2011**

Can I say something stupid? You can't really stop me.

I've always sort of wondered what it was that set Alejandro apart from all the other contestants for me, and I think yesterday's entry made me realize what it was.

Even though Alejandro was never explicitly kind and loving to me, and overall he didn't treat me a whole lot nicer than anyone else, something always set him apart.

I think that the difference between him and everyone else on the show is that he never treated me like my pedestal was undeserved.

He didn't bow before me and my seven-digit price tag, but he also never scoffed at it like it didn't belong there.

Alejandro never saw me as trash masquerading as a diamond, even when he was angry at me.

…

He thought I was a diamond.

-ℋ

 **June 5th, 2011**

I haven't touched the $600 or anything.

Of course I've been thinking about my dad's suggestion. How could I not? He had an obvious point. And the more I dwell on thoughts of Alejandro and pedestals and lava-gushing volcanos and hail spiking off of train tops, the more I want to see him again and fix things while there's still enough time to.

A couple of massive things stand between me and that fate, though. First, that I have no way of contacting him whatsoever, and second, if I _did_ have a way of contacting him, I'd…

I could spiral into a panic attack just _thinking_ about having that conversation.

But I guess that second problem can wait for now. I may as well tackle them in order.

This morning I decided I'd do some basic Google searching, just in case finding a number or an address would actually be that simple.

It took me an hour to find the courage just to open my laptop.

As I suspected, Google didn't have much information for me. In fact, it had pretty much _no_ information for me. But after clicking through enough pages of search results for "Alejandro Burromuerto," I did find someone I hadn't been looking for.

Sierra Skyze.

I had stumbled upon the link to one of her many, many Total Drama blogs, that to my surprise was still being frequently updated. Her last post was dated "ten minutes ago", and was a series of screenshots of Noah and Justin standing beside each other in crowd shots, followed by five paragraphs of "ship speculation" that was…

I don't even know how to put it. It was just so… _Sierra,_ that there was no doubt in my mind she was the one who wrote this. She is the only person in the world who could've _possibly_ written that.

I sat and scrolled through the blog for pages and pages, grinning like a loon. An embarrassing loon.

Not a single thing on it made sense, but it made no sense in a _Sierra_ kind of way that made me feel back at home. I mean, back on the show.

I was so convinced after the finale that I would never make contact with any of the previous contestants ever again.

I'd never even considered Sierra's online presence.

There was an animated envelope in the bottom left corner of the screen, blinking and flipping in circles. "MSSG ME!" was labeled beneath it in tacky 3D-text.

I clicked on it, and it redirected me to a much less decorated page. Awfully straightforward; a text box and a "send" button.

I considered my words very concisely.

At first, I wanted to ask her if she happened to have any of Alejandro's contact info. She did seem to have a lot of information on everyone, after all. But after seeing ten or twenty "Aleheather" posts _(no comment)_ , I knew if I sent her something like that, she'd post it for evidence in a heartbeat. I couldn't have that floating around.

So I hatched up an alternate plan.

I asked her if she knew how I could contact Cody. Because I knew for sure she'd have _that_ info at the ready, and… I had my reasons for wanting to talk to Cody.

For one, I could ask him about Alejandro without being a blog risk.

And… I wanted to thank him.

-ℋ

 **Author's note:**

 **Thank you so much to those of you who have clicked follow on this story, and those of you who left nice reviews or prompts.**

 **Like last time, if you want to leave a prompt for Heather to write about, you can leave it in the review section and I'll most likely do it (though it might not be in the very next chapter, I'll try to make it happen!)**

 **If you read this and enjoyed it, please let me know!**

 **Until the bitter end,**

 **-ℋ**


	3. Part 3

**[Author's note :  
Shout out to ffn user** **SophiaCrutchfeild for sacrificing their mascara not once, but twice for the sake of reading my angst. Thank you so much for the nice reviews, and I hope your party went well!~  
-ℋ ]**

 **June 8th, 2011**

Lots to write about; This is going to be a long one.

So - Sierra's response to my question completely baffled me.

"Sorry to do this to you, Heather - If you _are_ Heather, that is - but I can't just take your crudely typed word on that, you know? I'm gonna need some proof that you are who you say you are before I go giving out contestant's personal information."

I guess it wasn't a _totally_ psycho request, but it wasn't what I expected. It was news to me that there were enough people on the internet impersonating me on blogs to warrant this kind of mistrust. (Also, uh, crudely typed? Let the record show that I am _not_ that bad of a typist!)

I clicked away at the keyboard with two fingers and sent back a four word response.

"Proof?! Are you cracked?"

Her reply came with a sparkly ping just moments afterward. "You'd be surprised how intense Total Drama roleplayers can get! I've gotten TOOOONS of messages from fans pretending to be other contestants… Hehe. Desperate wannabes!"

I blinked a few times at the message, trying to let that reality sink into my head. This clashed completely with my expectations. Here I thought whatever Total Drama "fan base" there used to be a few years ago had diluted to nothing but Sierra and a day-old apple core by now.

"Ugh. If other people want to be me so bad, they can take over. I don't even wanna be me."

"Ummm…. I'm sorry?"

 _Ugh._

"What sort of proof are you expecting from me?"

Her responses came back so fast it seemed unnatural. "Ummmmm idk, a pic of your driver's license or other identification card? Post something to an official page? (Btw that status you posted last week was totes hilar!"

Evidently, Sierra stalks my facebook page. I was almost flattered I made the stalking cut. But mostly, I was just annoyed. I lowered my head into my hands in the way that Sierra often inspires.

This conversation already was setting off a weird mixture of emotions in me. She was aggravating me - a lot - but I felt… Completely elated to be aggravated? Does that even make sense? It's like, I've spent the past month feeling _nothing_ but depression and guilt and self-hate, and irritation was actually… Like a happy, familiar change of pace?

As I tried to decide whether there was any information on my driver's license that I didn't want Sierra (and thereby the entire internet) knowing, an idea hit me.

"How about a skype call? That'd prove I'm me and also give me an excuse to never see that image on your sidebar ever again."

"Wow okay. First of all. I drew that myself and it's great. Second: Sounds good to me! Send me a request and we can talk this afternoon."

 _This afternoon?_ Ugh, even Sierra has a busier life than I do! What the hell was I supposed to do for the next few hours other than sit and wait?!

I pouted and opened skype to send her the request she asked for. Then I scrolled up and down a list of offline contacts a few times. Then I minimized the window. And maximized it again. Then minimized it.

I was too nervous to think about anything but this upcoming conversation.

 _Wait, shit -_ I hopped up suddenly and rushed to my mirror, to find myself looking just as atrocious as I'd assumed. A month of isolation, terrible eating habits and crying all night will do that to you. The fact that my cheeks were still swollen from surgery didn't bode well for me either.

I guess it didn't _really_ matter how I looked in front of someone as irrelevant as _Sierra,_ but… I may as well look hot, right? Let her think my life is going well.

I bided my time by getting ready, trying very hard to look like I didn't try hard at all. By the time I was done, I was sure hours had passed, but it'd unfortunately been about seventeen minutes. Groan.

I sighed and returned to my computer. I stared at myself on the webcam for a few minutes to make sure I looked up to par. I fucked with the lighting in my room to make the image look better, a little brighter, a little duller - but eventually the tiny tinkering started driving me crazy and I gave up on it.

I returned to Sierra's blog and hit refresh on it a couple of times. Bored, but incapable of focusing on anything else, I started clicking other people's usernames in the comments. Dweeb. Bigger dweeb. Gwen-loving dweeb.

Who knew this many people still gave a fuck?

There was a picture of me wedged in a hole in Drumheller on a fan's blog, with a couple of "likes" listed below it. I boredly clicked one of the liker's URL's and it lead me to a page that made my heart shoot into my throat.

 _Hola! My name is Alejandro Burromuerto, Total Drama runner up, Arch-nemesis, Hypnotist, Ladies man. Message me ;)_

My blood ran cold for a second. _Was this Alejandro's page?!_

… No. Another two seconds of sight and common sense made me realize that this was a _roleplay blog._

Damn, Sierra really wasn't kidding. There are seriously people on the internet roleplaying Total Drama contestants? How creepy! They're not even doing a good job of it! I stared at the page for a few minutes and read through a few posts, and they made my stomach flip in circles. It was just a couple of answered questions and dead-end trails of crappy roleplays complete with pixelated reaction images…

But something about it just felt so _weird_. Like I wasn't supposed to be looking at it.

I think that's the normal response to seeing someone impersonating somebody you actually know on a creepy blog. But, it was kind of different than that. I felt like I was being intrusive on Alejandro's life somehow, even knowing this wasn't him. A few more moments on the page and the message system in the corner pinged.

I clicked over to it, expecting it to be Sierra telling me she was ready to talk, but to my surprise, it was from the "Alejandro" roleplay blog.

"((do you rp heather?))"

Oh my god. I didn't know whether to laugh or puke. My stomach churned a little but my heart was racing at the opportunity. The more logical part of me was telling me to exit the message and not look back, to leave the blog and just.. Go do something, _anything_ other than this. But my eyes were drawn to the picture of Alejandro on their sidebar, to his soft green eyes and his confident stature, and right then I felt like…

There was nothing I wouldn't do for the chance to speak to him again.

"((Yes. Heather is totally my character of choice.))"

"((you wanna rp?))"

I gulped.

"((Yeah, sure.))"

I felt like my mouth was filled with dirt. This felt very, very, very wrong. This was crazy! This is something that crazy people do! This guy - or girl - was probably some Canadian fourteen year old who just got home from school.

 _Close it, Heather. Just close this window. You're stronger than this._ But I wasn't. I hovered over the red X in the corner, but couldn't bring myself to click it. The message pinging noise was like shattering glass.

" _ALEJANDRO: I was laying on a hospital bed by myself, glaring at a tray of food the nurse brought up to me. I don't like hospital food because it's not healthy enough. But I had to eat something, so I decided I would. I just had to glare at it for another couple of minutes first, so the food would be well aware that I disliked it. ...Maybe I was a little bit loopy off of the medication.  
When the nurse came in to tell me I had a visitor, I hardly budged. I expected it to be one of my brother's by before work to check in on me, which was hardly worth the half-hearted grunt I gave it.  
But it wasn't either of my brothers that walked in.  
I rubbed my eyes and wondered if the meds had me hallucinating."_

I read through the message twice, shaking a bit. The world outside of my computer screen seemed to stop existing for the time being with the twist of a dimmer switch. I imagined Alejandro lying in a hospital bed, his skin still dark and red looking from burns I inadvertently caused. I wondered if the paragraph actually reflected his own thought process well, if he would've put those words in that same order. I tried to hear the narration in his voice, and it happened easily enough.

I had goosebumps. All parts of me that were screaming at me not to do this had silenced now. I slowly lowered my hands to the keys, but had no idea what to type.

What was I even thinking?! I had no idea how to roleplay, anyway. Much less roleplay... Myself.

Then I decided to act like it was one of Dr. Kenwar's crappy prompts, and the words came to me more easily. I imagined I was standing in front of Alejandro, in a hospital in Spain. What would I want to say to him?

" _HEATHER: I didn't know what I was doing in Spain.  
Even worse, I didn't know what I was doing in Spain alone.  
I didn't speak the language. I couldn't even read the road signs.  
But I was there, and though it hadn't really registered as real yet, so was Alejandro.  
I wanted to seem strong and capable, but it was hard to with all of my worst fears being revealed true - He looked awful. Covered in the sort of injuries I only thought possible in my nightmares.  
I racked my mind for something to say. On the plane ride here, I'd written out exactly the words I wanted him to hear, but now my brain was empty. I couldn't remember a single word from the page._

My heart started pounding faster as I typed, and I became more and more disillusioned with reality - I felt like I could feel the stale air of the hospital, feel the fear bubbling in my chest and his eyes watching me like a hawk. I kept typing, because I wasn't done yet.

 _I stared at him for a second, in hopes that maybe he'd speak first, but it didn't seem like I'd be that lucky. I opened my mouth and tried to find my voice, which had apparently hopped out the nearest window to it's concrete death a few floors below.  
I finally manage to stutter out a few syllables.  
'Alejandro, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for everything I've ever done to you.'  
My chest heaved in an immediate reaction to speaking those words out loud, but even as my face grew wet and then soaking, I forced myself to say the things I needed to say, because this might be my only chance to ever do so._

' _I never meant to hurt you. I meant to hurt a lot of people, but I never meant to hurt YOU. You are the only person in the world who has ever tried to understand me, the only person in the world who I've ever felt I understood, We had a bond. A bond deeper than any game, and more important than any million dollar win, but I was scared. And I ruined everything because I was scared, the way I always do. I didn't mean to. I didn't fucking meant to hurt you, I didn't mean to make you leave my life forever, I didn't mean to end you up here, and I didn't mean to make you hate me.  
God, I know you must hate me. I know I'm the last person you ever wanted to see again. There are so many better girls in the world. Nice girls, with nice, precise thoughts that make sense, and ways of showing affection that actually seem affectionate instead of harsh. There are girls out there who aren't so terrified of emotional connection that they run from it every time they feel it.  
But I've only felt it once.  
I've only felt love once before, and I don't think it will ever happen to me again after this. Please Alejandro, please fucking give me a chance to redeem myself, because if you don't I'm really scared I'm going to do something stupid and I'll never be able to be happy again  
I can't live with myself if the idea of you ever being in my life again is out of the picture indefinitely  
I hate myself for hurting you, and not just physically  
I know I fucking wrecked you emotionally too and I promise I've been paying the price for it  
Please let's try again Alejandro  
Please, I can't take this anymore_

I'd opened a can, and the emotions I hadn't even allowed myself to _think_ about all came crashing out of me like a dam busting open. A waterfall poured from both of my eyes, only much less elegant - More like a thunderstorm. My insides burned like bubbling lava but I was so freezing I couldn't keep my hands steady over the keys anymore. I let myself fall to my side and bunch the blanket around me and sobbed pathetically.

My mom rushed in a few moments later to ask what in the hell was wrong. Fuck, I'd forgotten there were other people in the house. I'd forgotten there were other people in the _world._

I had thick black lines of makeup down my cheeks as I lay there, shuddering and shaking and gasping for breath that wouldn't come to me. She paused in the doorway for a few moments, likely blanking completely on what to do. I think I would've, too. Eventually she walked to my bedside and pulled me against her chest like a child, stroking my hair and trying to train me to breathe properly as I descended into a panic attack in her arms.

It was clear she had no idea what to do, but I was happy to have somebody there. I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed like I was trying to let every single drop of emotion out of me; to cry out until there was nothing left.

It was horrible, but at the same time, a bit relieving. The more I cried, the more I felt like a heavy weight had been lifted off of my chest.

I know any sane person would judge me for what I just did, but… I needed to say those things to Alejandro. And maybe I didn't actually say them to _him,_ but I did in spirit, and I felt better for it.

When I calmed down enough that I was properly breathing and could almost form words, my mom brought me out of my room and made me some hot chocolate. We sat and watched a movie together and it was okay. She didn't say a word about what happened. She still doesn't know how to react to my clear drop in mental state since the show.

I fell asleep very quickly from the exhaustion of all of that emotional exertion, and as a result missed Sierra's skype call.

It wasn't until the next morning that I saw what "Alejandro" replied with.

 _(( :/ not to be rude bc this is probably one of your first times but.. you're really OOC. heather would never act like that. she has control of her emotions.))_

-ℋ


	4. Part 4

**June 9th, 2011**

Sierra lives in what I can only describe as a hut.

"Where the hell are you?"

She very politely misunderstood my question. "Hawaii!"

"Oh, wow. Not a long train ride home for you, then, I guess."

She laughed and the familiarity of the noise warmed my chest a bit. "Nope! I actually called my mom from the scene of the finale and asked her to come pick me up in her car…"

The mental image of that made me laugh, and she did too. For a minute, we seemed like two good friends, giggling over gossip on a skype call. It felt very normal.

"I like, picked up my phone and dialed my mom and was like, uh… Mommy? The volcano kind of.. erupted… and she was like _I know, I could feel it from here!_ I was literally like, fifteen minutes from my house."

"That's… hilarious. By the looks of your house I bet the plane must've felt like a five star resort."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh Heather, you're just as mean as I remember!"

I smiled wide. "Thank you!"

"You look… nice…" She forced through a smile. I rolled my eyes, leaning back on my bed and putting my laptop on my stomach.

"Oh shut up. I look like hell."

"I suspect the finale's taken something of a toll on you?" she asked, sounding almost sympathetic. I didn't respond. "Are you… okay?"

She caught me before I could snap, talking over my objections. "It's just! You look.. thinner. And not in a healthy way. Like, _I've-stressed-myself-half-to-death-thinner."_

I blinked a few times in consideration. "Do I really?" I looked down at my arms and wondered if I really had lost weight without realizing. Were my cheeks sunken in? Did I really look overstressed at a glance? I studied my image in the webcam and deflated.

"You're not going to post about this on your blog, are you?" I asked, sounding a little more worried than I meant to.

"Of course not!" she chirped, though she sounded almost offended. "Especially since you just asked me not to… I mean, why do you think I didn't just send you what you wanted over text? I _do_ respect people's privacy…"

I snorted despite myself. "Um, if I remember World Tour correctly, and I think I do, Cody's largest complaint about you was an inability to respect people's privacy."

At first she looked sad. Then she looked angry, arms crossed over her chest. "Forgive me if I'm wrong, Heather, but didn't you call me to ask for a _favor?"_

I sat back a bit, impressed. "Look who's growing a backbone! Congrats, crazypants! You're almost cool enough for me to fuck with you."

"Um, excuse me? You want to _what_ me?"

I turned red but rolled my eyes as hard as I could manage. "Figure of speech, you moron!"

"Wow Heather. Don't get me wrong, I watched season 3 enough times to pick up on your blatant lesbian subtext, but until now I thought it was just fan-pandering. I hate to break it to you, but I'm a one-Codykins kind of girl!"

My mouth hung open for a second before I started sputtering to explain myself and call her a couple of rude names, but… Then I saw the smirk spread across her face, and the laughter she was trying to hold back. It dawned on me that she was tongue-in-cheek. She was making a joke.

My expression relaxed, then coiled into something bewildered and impressed.

"Wow. When did _you_ turn into somebody cool to talk to?"

She burst into Sierra-like giggles. "Eh… I know a month isn't an incredibly long time, but.. I've done a lot of self reflection since the last time you saw me."

I nodded slowly, cocking my head a bit at the image on my screen.

"No, trust me, I… know what you mean," I said quietly. She smiled a bit, and I actually returned it. "Let me just say, if you'd acted more like this in World Tour, we could've had a pretty kickass alliance together."

"Seriously, Heather? You're being kind of gay."

I lowered my head into my hands and just laughed.

I felt suddenly like Sierra… Spoke my language. Like she knew how to talk to me; how to joke with me. I guess that's one of the perks of befriending someone who's obsessed with the TV show you were on and hyper-analyzed all of your interactions. At the same time, I wondered why she somehow seemed so different now than she did on the show.

A part of me wondered if the difference was that Cody wasn't around now. Had his presence sucked her personality up like a black hole of love?

Had Alejandro ever done that to me?

Sierra and I's skype call timed out at 6 and a half hours. I didn't even think I was capable of that. We talked _all night_ , talking about things that had happened since the end of season three and sending really ugly screenshots of one another back and forth to laugh at.

I even ended up telling her about the Alejandro roleplay account and how I masqueraded as a fan, and the last message they sent me insinuating I hadn't done a very good job at being myself.

She laughed so hard she had tears in her eyes, and I crossed my arms and pouted, regretting ever having told her. I hadn't really expected her to make fun of me. … and she wasn't.

"Heather, I'm sorry, just…" she paused to laugh a bit more, wiping one of her eyes. "That is the most adorable thing I have ever heard in my entire life."

The call eventually came to a close because my dad wanted to take me out to dinner - but not before I made sure to get Cody's phone number. That was the entire reason I'd skyped her, after all.

My dad took me to my favourite restaurant that I know he hates, which told me immediately that he was trying to butter me up for some reason. Why, I wasn't sure yet.

We settled into a booth with two oyster pails of rice and a container of sweet and sour chicken, and my dad gave an annoyed sigh.

"Heathen, I really don't understand why you like these Americanized "Chinese" restaurants so much. We're _Japanese._ And even if we weren't, this is hardly authentic…"

I shoved a piece of chicken in my mouth and grinned. "What, because I'm Japanese I'm not allowed to love racist depictions of Asians?"

"...Pretty much, yeah."

"Fuck the status quo." I popped open one of the oyster pails and spooned some rice on my plate, and he laughed a little.

"You seem to be in a good mood."

I kicked my feet happily beneath the table and nodded, popping another piece of chicken into my mouth. "I am!"

"Has.. something changed since the other night?"

I realized then why he was taking me to my favourite restaurant. My mom had told him about the breakdown she'd walked in on.

"Kind of." I was being vague, but only because I hadn't given it much thought myself yet.

Talking to Sierra really _had_ cheered me up a lot. She was so shameless, it allowed me to be kind of shameless myself. I finally had a person to talk to about my problems other than my diary or Dr. Kenwar - neither of which actually responded to the things I said like Sierra did.

"What changed?" he asked, pulling the open oyster pail towards himself.

I rolled the sentence over in my head a few times before voicing it. "I made a friend."

My dad dropped his spoon and placed a hand over his chest melodramatically.

I laughed despite myself and told him to stop it, but he continued on his little act. "MY Heathen? Made a FRIEND?"

"Yes, dad, a friend."

He smirked and leaned forward on the table. "Who is it?"

"One of the girls from the competition," I replied, the normal bitterness in my voice lifted.

"Oh man…" He slumped suddenly and looked annoyed. _"Please_ tell me it's not Gwen!"

. . .

I knew I loved my dad for a reason.

-ℋ

 **June 9th, 2011**

I went to see Dr. Kenwar today and didn't actually take him up on the opportunity to write all hour instead of talking to him. I talked to him about pawning the gold tooth, and saving the money to eventually see Alejandro. I explained my roundabout plan for getting ahold of him through Sierra and then Cody.

"Right… They were the other two in the bottom four, correct?"

I paused. "Wait, you've seen the show?" That seemed really, really weird. I felt almost like he'd invaded my privacy, even if it was a public show.

"Well, of course I have. I do a background check on all of my clients."

Suddenly I wasn't sure which would be weirder: him having seen the show, or him _not_ having seen the show. I just nodded.

"Yeah. Sierra and Cody were the other two in the bottom four."

"Well, I think it's good that you've been reconnecting with old friends. How have the night terrors been? You haven't mentioned them in a while."

Oh… He was right, wasn't he? I hadn't had one of those in a little while! I hadn't even realized they were gone well enough to appreciate their absence. I smiled a little.

"Yeah I've been.. getting some pretty good sleep lately."

"Well, Heather, it looks like things are looking up for you. Before long you might not even need me."

I don't know why, but that insinuation kind of scared me.

-ℋ

 **[ Author's note:**

 **Sorry for the slightly shorter chapter. :) I'm not going to be able to post for a little while, so it may be a bit of a break before the next addition. Thank you all so much for reading, and if you like it, be sure to hit follow so you'll be notified of the next post.**

 **Until the bitter end,**

 **-ℋ ]**


	5. Part 5

**Author's Note:**

 **Thank you all so much for reading this story. Feedback on it means the world to me! As it's beginning to draw to a close, I'd like it if you'd all let me know if you'd be interested in reading something similar to this in the future . . .  
-ℋ**

 **June 11th, 2011**

I don't know who Noah Sterecra is.

I know that he's smart, and that he loves to read.

I know that when he's not on the show, he still wears sweater vests. And that he likes checker-print.

I know he doesn't like to talk to people, and that he listens to a lot of music.

I know that when he saw me crying on the train, he almost looked concerned.

I know that for three years of my life, he was there, in the background, silently.

But I don't know who Noah Sterecra is,

and I don't know Cody's birthday.

and I don't know whether or not Lindsay dyes her hair,

or if Harold even remembers that conversation we had after season one, or if he even knows that it meant anything to me,

I don't know what LaShawna's hobbies are,

or what Duncan went to juvie for.

It's been 48 days since Noah Sterecra was ushered off of the train; the last trace of the show exiting my peripheral vision.

48 days since the show that was 3 years of my life ended.

48 days without the people that fill my memories with color and meaning,

but the truth is I don't know anything about any of them.

I don't even have the right to miss them.

-ℋ

 **June 12th, 2011**

Sierra knows the answers to all of my questions, and then some.

Noah wants to study to become a lawyer and came to the show to escape the tension in his household after his sister's death. Cody's birthday is April 1st. Lindsay is a natural blonde, but it's fading into brown as she ages, so she bleaches it. Harold still talks about me as if we were close, so he probably remembers our conversation well enough. LaShawna works at a nail salon, but what she really wants to do is teach art. Duncan went to juvie the first time for two accounts of breaking and entering while helping his upperclassmen with a "senior prank."

Empty places in my memory are slowly filling with information the more Sierra talks to me. I regret more and more each day not actually making an effort to learn these things myself.

I wonder if anyone on that show knew anything about me. The more I start to see of other people's lives, the more I start to think mine must seem kind of empty.

I've barely left my room in 48 days except to see Dr. Kenwar -

 _(Who, by the way, I saw in Walmart yesterday._

 _He was with a woman, and I ignored him, because I figured that's what you're supposed to do. But he saw me, and he said hi, and introduced me to the woman as "a friend". Not "a patient"._

 _And he didn't seem cold and menacing like he does in therapy, either. He seemed like a regular person. He even smiled. The woman he was with seemed perfectly average and friendly._

 _He makes less sense to me every time I see him, in a way that kind of makes me want to pretend I don't know him.)_

I did talk to Cody, too. I forgot to say that - Mostly because it was an embarrassing experience, so I'm trying to pretend it didn't happen. It was weirdly silent. Aren't all phone conversations with boys kind of that way? It's like they don't know how phones work. You're supposed to _talk into them._

It was pretty much up to me to initiate all conversation, which I was nervous as hell to do, so it was… Quiet.

I said what I wanted to say, though - I thanked him for what he said to me during the finale. He laughed, and I regretted saying anything. And things were silent again.

When I asked him why he wasn't saying anything, he said it was because his hamster was sleeping on his chest and he didn't want to wake it. _Ummm…. OK then?_

… I don't think I'm as capable of talking to boys as I thought I was. Maybe I should give female friendships a second chance after all. Boys just boggle my mind sometimes.

I guess they can't all be as intelligent as my dad. … or Alejandro.

I asked Cody if he'd heard anything of Alejandro before hanging it up and freeing myself of the silence…. Predictably, he had nothing for me. No contact info whatsoever. I couldn't even find it in myself to be disappointed.

The money still sits in my jewelry box.

I'm starting to feel like a square peg. Why does everyone seem so hard to understand?

-ℋ

 **June 13th, 2011**

I walked into Dr. Kenwar's room today, and plopped down into one of the uncomfortable wooden chairs with the worn housewife cushions, like I always do.

Then I pulled my journal from my bag, wiped the surface of the glass table top, and set it down. I didn't say anything, because I hardly ever do. Aside from the one conversation last week, I usually just came in and wrote for an hour and left. No eye contact required.

But today while I was fishing for my pen in my bag to start writing, he stopped me. "Ah, ah ah," he cooed stupidly, like a mother wagging her finger back and forth.

I couldn't help my disgusted expression. Or maybe I could, but I didn't try. I glanced over at him in a way that probably seemed more like a glare. "What?"

"Let me see it."

He reached over and grabbed the book by it's binding, casting the green ribbon off behind it. My face paled.

"You mean you're going to read it?"

"Mhm."

Fear filled my face for a moment. He'd never _read_ the diary before! Every once in a while he'd give me a topic, or ask me what I'd written about, but he'd never actually _read_ the words!

But it was happening. All the normalcy and friendliness I'd seen in his face at the store the other day was completely gone without a trace. He was awkward and faultless and mechanical, eyes metal and stoney and cold. If I watched them, I could see them follow the lines of my writing, all the way to the right, and then back to the left margin.

For what bordered on twenty minutes, I just sat there, slowly growing redder. I tried desperately to remember everything I wrote - Had I said anything all that embarrassing? Oh, _God,_ had I said anything bad about _him?_ I suddenly couldn't recall a single word.

The room was deathly silent as I teetered awkwardly in my seat, wondering what page he was on, and if he was going to ask me things about it. I focused on the clock behind him, until the tiny ticking noise started getting to me. Then I scanned his face for any kind of reaction, but there was nothing to gauge. When he flipped the pages, it felt as loud as a bomb.

I was red and sweaty and cold by the time he set the book back down.

He took off his glasses and cleaned them with a little square of fabric. _Was he drawing this out on purpose?_

Then he leaned forward, looked me in the eyes and said, _"What do you want, Heather?"_

I froze, even more so than I already was. What do I _want?_ I didn't even understand what he meant by that! I must have looked as dumbfounded as I felt, because he clarified.

"Why are you coming here? What is it that you're aiming for?" His voice felt heavy and authoritative and… Like I was in trouble. He sounded like a principal.

My face reddened a bit more as I realized I didn't know the answer to that.

"Aren't you supposed to be the one who knows that?" I said in a tone that leaned dangerously close to a whimper. "Help me… form goals, or whatever?!" I loudly motioned towards a poster on the wall about goal formation.

He didn't say anything, just stared me down as I sat there feeling like I was under a microscope.

"Can I have my book back?" I asked quietly after the silence had gone on too long.

"Nope."

 _Tick. … Tick. … Tick. … Tick. … Tick._

I realized he wasn't going to do or say anything until I answered his question. I tried to push some serious thought to it.

"... I want to feel okay." I said softly, and a hot wet fog threatened at the back of my eyes. "I don't know how, or by what means, but I want to feel okay again."

He relaxed his stature a little, making him appear only a bit less robotic. "So you think you've felt okay before, then?"

 _Yikes. Why the third degree?_ I crossed my arms over my chest and thought.

"I don't know. I... "

Had I ever really felt okay before?

"... Maybe not."

"But you just said _again."_ He pointed out.

I looked up. "Huh?"

"A moment ago. You said you wanted to feel okay _again._ When was 'okay'?"

There weren't any words.

"Think about it." He urged. "Close your eyes, really focus on what you were referring to when you said _again."_

So I closed my eyes, and tried to pretend I wasn't in Dr. Kenwar's room. I racked through my memory like one of those poster displays at the store, searching for a time that I felt better than I did right then.

Alejandro flashed through my mind. A time he stroked my cheek, a time he touched my shoulder. When we hugged after winning a challenge together.

Then I thought about my skype conversation with Sierra.

Then a time in season one that we all sat around a campfire and talked about our fears.

A conversation with Harold in a canoe.

Me, Gwen and Owen in a treehouse.

My dad and I eating Chinese takeout.

"... Being with my friends." I said quietly.

I opened my eyes, and something was different.

Dr. Kenwar was smiling at me.

-ℋ


	6. Part 6

**June 22nd, 2011**

Last week I was sitting around on my laptop like I always am, but I wasn't locked up in my room this time. I was in the dining room, and the sun spilled in through the glass doors to our deck, and my mom was cooking a stewpot.

It was a Wednesday, and my dad had just gotten home from work, but would have to set out again in an hour - he had two jobs, because for some reason, he liked to have two jobs. Something awful in the pit of my stomach told me it was because he didn't want to spend time with my mom. I didn't really want to spend time with my mom either, but he should, because he's her husband.

But I know they aren't very happy together - I've always known that.

I know that they only had me because they thought I would fix their marriage. That's why all of my brothers and sisters are in their thirties, and I'm just seventeen.

I know that I didn't fix their marriage. I feel kind of guilty for it, like I did something wrong, and maybe, if I was a better kid, maybe I _could've_ fixed their marriage.

But I wasn't thinking about any of that then, when I was sitting in the dining room and the sun was shining through the glass. My dad was in the shower - I could tell because I could hear it running in the other room. And I was dressed, in the sort of outfit I used to wear to school. A loose white top that only covered a bit lower than my chest, a ribbon of lace hanging around my stomach. And jean shorts. Light wash, the dumb kind that look like they've been ripped and torn when you buy them. And I thought they were dumb. But I wore them, because they were cute. I'd bought them when I was fifteen, but they still fit me.

I'd packed them for season one, but we didn't get to keep our luggage.

My hair was up in a bun. It'd been really tight and clean, but I thought it made me look like a school teacher, or an anxious freak, so I loosened it and pulled a few strands out. And I was drinking a slushie from a styrofoam cup. It was cherry, and it was way too sweet, but my dad had brought it home for me, so I was drinking it.

My mom looked over at me and she smiled really wide, and it made my face turn red. I knew she was smiling at me because I had dressed up, and she loved when I did that. I don't know why, but I hate that she loves when I do that. "Going somewhere?" she asked, and I pretended I didn't hear her.

She walked over and took my head into her hands, making me look at her. I let her, even though my face showed that I very much disliked her doing it. "Your makeup looks good. Your wings are off, though. You should let me teach you to do your eyeliner better. There are tricks for that stuff."

I scowled and hated that she was trying to make regular conversation with me, because it doesn't work like that.

My mom and I have hardly said three words to one another since I was fifteen, and you can't just come back from that with casual conversation.

But I was in a good mood, and I didn't want to let my disdain for her ruin my happiness, so I just turned back to my computer and kept typing. "They look fine. I'm not breaking out a protractor for my eyeliner wings."

She laughed like I'd just said something much funnier than I'd really said. It made me feel tired. Why couldn't she just be real? Why could we not just be honest and straight with each other and be like, "Clearly our relationship is fucked. What should we do about that?" instead of just… Faking it and pretending things are okay when they're not.

I realized, when I thought that, that that's a trait I got from her, and a trait that sent Alejandro down the side of a volcano - because I couldn't be more real with people - and I stopped my thoughts cold.

I backspaced a few lines of the email I was typing and focused harder on it.

"What are you typing over there?" my mom asked, returning to her stewpot.

"Emails," I replied, and it wasn't a lie. That was strange, because I always lied to my mother, even when I had no reason to.

When I was fifteen, and I hadn't left for season one yet, I didn't like my mom. I didn't like her, because my Dad took so much interest in me, and he came to school events even when I asked him not to, and he would get knowledgable on my hobbies so he could talk with me about them, and he always asked me and talked to me about the things I did and the people I knew.

And I didn't like my mom, because she didn't really care about those things. She would ask idle questions, like "How was school?" sometimes, because she didn't want it to be too obvious that she didn't care - but she didn't, and I began to realize that if I answered those questions with blatant lies, she would never notice, because she didn't care enough to pay attention like my dad did.

So I told her nothing but lies, all the time, because it didn't matter. I told her I was going to Joslin's that weekend when I was really going to Auden's, because I knew if I said that to my dad, he would say, "But wait, I thought you hated Joslin because she was dating that Jackson kid from Summit," but my mom wouldn't say that. She would just nod and say "that's nice," because she wasn't listening.

My mom didn't know me when I was fifteen, and now I was eighteen, and I'd been gone for a large chunk of the past three years except for a few months between Action and World Tour, and I had spent all of that time with my dad and at parties anyway.

Now I was eighteen, and I had changed a lot in three years, and she hadn't watched the show like my dad did, either. So she knew nothing. She had no idea who her daughter was. And she wanted to know what I was doing on the computer.

Instead of asking me the things she really needed to know, like who I was, and what I liked and disliked, and what I thought about things, she wanted to know what I was doing on the computer.

As if I was someone she knew and was close with. But I wasn't.

Usually I would lie, and say I was playing a game, or using Facebook.

But I didn't. I told her I was emailing, and I was.

"Emails to who?"

"LaShawna Olongalla," I said, and that wasn't a lie either.

"Oh… That's nice. Is she from your high school?"

I sucked loudly on the straw of the slushie my dad had brought home for me. He would've known exactly who LaShawna was. He would've been shocked, and he would've given me that look - that look of "are you up to something?" that he puts on all the time, that looks half suspicious and half intrigued.

But my mom didn't know who LaShawna was, and for all she knew, she _did_ go to my high school, because she didn't miss me enough when I was gone to watch a single stupid episode.

"Yeah," I lied. "She's from my old high school."

"Oh! Was she that Americaneze girl you had over a few times?"

Americaneze was what my mom called Asians who only speak English… Like me. It wasn't funny, or clever, but she thought it was both of those things, and she was talking about Auden, who moved away two years ago, and was only half Korean anyway.

"Yeah." I said boredly. "That was LaShawna alright."

"I thought so!" she chimed proudly, and I rolled my eyes.

There was a reason I was emailing LaShawna. And she wasn't the only one I was emailing, either. Sierra and I were getting in contact with every single contestant we could find a line to.

Harold, Cody, Noah, Katie and Sadie, Beth, Justin, Trent, DJ…

Not Alejandro.

When Cody didn't have Alejandro's information, I sucked it up and asked Sierra, because we're closer by now, and I was less scared of her blogging about me… But she didn't know either. And that's when I _really_ got hopeless, because if _Sierra_ didn't know how to get ahold of him, no one would.

I supposed it wouldn't _hurt_ to ask some of the other contestants too, but that wasn't why we were emailing them.

We were putting together a get together… A camping trip.

Because Dr. Kenwar said so.

And I needed to see these people again, outside of a competition,

so I could learn things I should've learned back then,

like that Justin likes to tell a lot of jokes, or that Katie and Sadie conned their mothers into marriage for step-sister status,

and I would learn those things myself, by talking to them, like a friend.

And Noah Sterecra leaving a train wouldn't be the last time I saw anyone from the cast anymore.

" _Wait. Katie, Sadie AND Beth are going to be there?"_ Justin pinged in my inbox.

I snickered. "Afraid so."

" _... Is it too late to cancel my RSVP?"_

I laughed a little under my breath, hitting reply again to answer him, but I was interrupted again.

"Is LaShawna being funny?" my mom asked, and I rolled my eyes in the most exaggerated way I could.

"Yeah. Hilarious. You know those Americaneze girls and their funny, funny jokes."

Either she sensed my sarcasm and decided smartly to stop talking, or she didn't and thought we'd just had a successful conversation.

My dad was getting ready for job #2, and he walked out with his work clothes on, hair sopping wet because that man refuses to pick up a hair dryer.

"Do you need a ride to therapy, Heathen?" he asked me, tying his tie. I shook my head.

"Not today, he doesn't want to see me again until next week. You can drop me off at the camp grounds, though."

"Cornerstone?" I nodded. "What for?"

"Planning a camping night, I want to go see if they'd be a good spot."

"You didn't tell me you were planning to camp!" my mom toted.

"You didn't ask," I said blandly, not shifting my eyes from my dad. He ran his hands through his wet hair and asked for a drink of my slushie, which was half melted by then, but I gave it to him anyway.

"I used to be addicted to these when I was younger," he said, and I grinned.

"I know. You still are."

"Am not." he said, but drank about half of what was left of it anyway. "I'll take you to Cornerstone if you want, but I don't know how you'll get home."

"Mom can come get me," I said.

"I've got to make dinner!" she protested. But it was stew. It cooked for hours. She could leave it for five minutes to come get me from camp.

She just didn't want to. My voice grew ten levels of bitter really fast.

"I guess I'll hike then," I said, trying to conceal a scowl that my dad picked up on immediately.

"We'll talk about it in the car," he said, and he motioned like he wanted to leave.

I wanted to leave, too, so I took my computer under my arm and went.

"What do you think?" I asked. I was holding my laptop awkwardly in my arms, trying to aim the webcam around a dusty clearing. The battery was already beeping low at me, and the sun made it hard for me to see the screen, but such is life.

"I think it looks perfect!" Sierra's voice buzzed from the bottom speakers. "It's just big enough! How many tents do you think we'll need?"

"That comes down to how many people can make it.." I said, aiming the webcam around again. "Not everyone can afford a flight or a train ride. I mean, trains are relatively inexpensive, but some people _have_ to fly. I've got about.. six hundred dollars that I could use to help people get here, but that probably won't cover everybody. How expensive does a flight get?"

"Wait-" Her voice comes in staticy and thick. "I thought you were saving that money to go see Alejandro!"

I sighed and sat on a log on the ground, turning the laptop to face me on my lap. It wasn't the most flattering camera angle, but I didn't care at the moment. "... I thought so too."

I frowned, and she probably did too, but I couldn't see my screen in the sun.

"We'll find him, alright? He can't hide forever."

"He probably doesn't even want to see me."

She laughed again - she does that a lot. She thinks I'm funny for some reason. So does Cody.

"Don't be ridiculous, Heather! That boy was _crazy_ about you!"

"Yeah," I blurted, " _Was._ Things have changed."

She sighed, and I could make out her shaking her head at me. "Take it from me, it takes a _lot_ to stop true love once it's gripped you." I smiled a little even though I didn't want to.

"Speaking of true love!" she chimed with the energy of a wind up toy, "Cody is totally definitely coming! He's even excited to see me! _EEEEEEE!"_

I sucked in one cheek and and raised an eyebrow. "Really? I'm surprised he'd want to come to something I'm hosting."

"Huh? Why?"

"I called him the other day and… It was preeeetty awkward. I don't think he likes me."

She giggled and snorted. "He doesn't talk on the phone because he knows I monitor his calls!"

Things made a little more sense then, and I couldn't help but laugh.

"He adores you!" she chirped. "He's totally excited to see everybody again!"

"If you say so." I grinned and looked around the campsite again. The sun was slowly starting to lower, and I knew I should head home soon.

"I think this was a really good idea." Sierra said. "And I can't wait to see you in person!"

"... Really?" I asked, recoiled and a bit taken aback.

"Of course! We're friends now, aren't we?"

I blinked a few times. I hadn't really thought about Sierra being here in the flesh. Would she hug me? Would we sit and talk for hours like we had on skype, only right beside each other? Would it be weird?

"... Yeah. I'm pretty sure we're at that stage. We can use the F word."

"Wait…" she said. "Which F word?"

I rolled my eyes, knowing she was messing with me. " _Friends._ You just said it."

"Oh!" she laughed. "I thought you were trying to flirt with me again. You've got a real problem about that."

I gave an annoyed stare to the webcam and she laughed harder, making the corners of my mouth twitch up a bit. "I know, right?" I joked. "Be careful once you get here! I might not be able to keep my hands off of you."

-ℋ


	7. Part 7

**June 29th, 2011**

I woke up this morning with an IV in my arm.

Except it wasn't morning. It was a little past dinner time. But I couldn't remember how I got there, or what was going on, or anything that may have happened after having gone to bed the previous night, so when I woke, I was just confused not to be in my room.

Then I tried to move and felt a sharp pain from the crook of my arm, and another from the left side of my head. My breath immediately heightened. A hospital room. The realization played across my mind and shot adrenaline into my bloodstream. That was where I was. In a hospital room alone. _What was I doing there?_

A heart monitor beside me started beeping fervently, sending a nurse scurrying in. She smiled a big fake smile. "You're awake!"

I looked around, confused. "What am I doing here?"

She looked a little pained for a moment, cocking her head slightly. "You don't remember?"

I shook my head. She let out a breath. "I figured that might be the case. But it should return to you in time. Right now, you need to rest and not worry."

"What happened?!" I demanded again. I wasn't in an excruciating amount of pain, or any pain really, aside from a dull panging from the left side of my head. She avoided answering the question again, instead pushing me back down in bed and telling me to calm down.

"Do you want me to bring your parents in?"

"I guess?" I said, a certain tone of sarcasm in my voice that made her frown. "Will _they_ tell me what the hell is going on?"

"I suppose that's.. their own choice." says the nurse with another big fake smile.

I was annoyed. Wasn't what happened to _me_ moreso _my_ business than anyone elses?!

She walked quickly out of the room in her heels, which made them _clip-clop_ against the floor in a way that sounded kind of like a horse. That thought made me laugh - Seriously laugh, out loud and everything. Then I wondered if I was doped up on something, and looked back down at the IV in my arm.

After a few minutes of silence ringing between machine beeps and quiet clock ticks, my mom and dad came shuffling into the room, looking very business. My dad was stressed. I could tell by the state of his hair.

"Hey Heathen…" he said quietly, like he was trying to coax an injured kitten out of hiding. "How are you feeling?"

"Weird," I said truthfully. "What the hell happened?"

"You had an… Episode." said my mom, and she made wide eyes when she said the word 'episode,' like the kind of eyes moms make when they're trying to be politically correct. Like when moms say words like "African American" or "Significant Other" and they make their eyes all big like they're doing you a big favor with their sensitive wording.

I had no idea what she meant by that.

"I don't know what you're talking about. Last thing I remember is going to bed last night."

"Last.. night?" asked my dad in a voice that scared me. "It all happened last night, Heathen."

The blood drained from my face. "What day is it?"

"Wednesday," he said, putting a hand to my forehead. "The twenty ninth."

"... Last I remember is Monday night." I said quietly. "What happened?"

"Well…" my dad frowned. "I wasn't there, Heathen. I was at work. Your mother called me saying you were acting weird and out of it and she thought you were hallucinating. And I told her you were probably fine, just to make sure you didn't hyperventilate, which.. She was having trouble doing."

I didn't breathe, listening intently. Was he serious?

"Then.. Then you passed out, and she couldn't get you to wake up, so I… I rushed home."

I reached up and touched the side of my head, where the pain was coming from.

"I was trying to walk you to the couch when you fainted," my mom explained. "You collapsed and hit your head on the table. Got a concussion, that's why I couldn't get you up."

"A concussion…" I repeated slowly. "... Mom, I don't remember any of this. I was hallucinating?"

She nodded, and I felt more and more uncomfortable. I'd forgotten an entire day of my life? No, a day and a half?

"Do you have any idea why?" I asked. She hesitated before shaking her head.

"You seemed fine all morning. Just, typing on your computer. 'More emails', you told me. You were being perfectly normal, if a bit quiet. Then I went across the street to talk to the neighbors, and.. When I came back, you were acting really weird. You were shaking really hard and whimpering, and I couldn't get your attention. I kept saying your name and you wouldn't respond to me. You wouldn't acknowledge that I was even there."

I swallowed hard. She continued: "And it just.. Got quickly worse. I didn't know what to do, or what was going on. You started crying and you talked a bit but.. None of it made any sense."

"What did I say?"

She didn't answer. I shook and tried to wrap my mind around all of that.

It didn't sound completely foreign. I'd gone into "episodes" similar to that a lot of times, all usually in Dr. Kenwar's room, but never to the extent that I lost ties to reality. Never to the extent that someone couldn't pull me out of it. Never to the point that I couldn't remember it when I woke up.

Maybe my not remembering things had more to do with the concussion than anything else.

"... I was emailing all day?" I asked. She nodded. "Do you have my phone? Maybe I can read through the conversations I was having. Maybe they'll make things come back to me."

My dad gave me my phone, and I stared at the date and time for a moment. 7:05 PM. 6/29/11.

"You want us to go run out and get you something to eat while you catch up, Heathen? I think they might wanna keep you tonight."

I nodded slowly. "Yeah. That sounds good. Thanks Dad."

"Maybe I should stay with her!" my mom insisted. I shook my head. "No, I.. I wanna be alone for a minute. I need to focus."

They left me alone, then, and I opened my email to find so much more than I expected. There was not just one, but several threads I had no recollection of at all. I took a deep breath, goosebumps over my skin. I started at the earliest one I didn't recall.

A conversation with LaShawna.

I was sort of confused as to why I was emailing LaShawna of all people, because she'd been the first person I'd contacted when it came to talking about the trip. I was way further down the list by now. Why would I have gone back to the top?

 **HEATHER:** _Sorry this is so freakin' unorganized T_T We're kind of at a spot of... Absolutely no idea who is or isn't coming because Sierra totally sucks.  
So I'm trying to actually get a list of RSVP's now - You're definitely coming, right? & Did you need help affording a train?  
-ℋ_

Ah. Now I remembered. Sierra had been totally livid with me when she realized I hadn't been keeping solid track of who was and wasn't coming. She made me start all over again with the contestant list so I could mark down concrete yesses, no's and maybes.

 **LASHAWNA:** _Didn't think Sierra would be the kind of person to mix up plans for a meet-up like this, but half of me isn't too surprised.  
Wouldn't miss it for the world, girl. I'm sure my dads won't have a problem lending me the money to get there.  
The offers real nice, don't think I didn't notice. Might need to be careful though, your sweet lil heart's showing._

(It was totally my fault. Not Sierra's.)

 **HEATHER:** _Ewwwwwwww as if.  
I have no heart. Within my chest cavity is an unfathomable paradox. The absence of nothing, but not the presence of something. Something so dark that it circles back around to a light so blinding that it is, in fact, dark.  
... Or something like that. :P  
Are you still in regular contact with any of the other contestants? We haven't been able to find ties to some people and... We found an address for Harold, but nothing else, so we had like. Write him. We expect a reply in two to four weeks. LOL.  
Nothing like planning a party via snail mail…_

 **LASHAWNA:** _Haha, sounds like him. Well I mean, he only gave me his username for some game he plays online with... I think Cody. Not gonna lie, sometimes I get on there just to see how things are doing. He's usually way too busy playing his games, so maybe you could ask Cody to talk to him. He'd have better luck probably.  
I talk to Gwen all the time and Courtney on occasion. Also the new stepsisters. Not too sure how helpful that is, but it's all I got.  
(PS-I don't believe any of the heartlessness bull for even a second ; ) )_

 **HEATHER:** _Wow. I totally would've thought you and Harold would've kept in touch better than that. You guys seemed really tight. But a lot of things that seemed true on the show weren't necessarily._

My heart started pounding. I was starting to remember this conversation now, and I was silently begging myself to not do the thing I knew I was about to do.

 **HEATHER:** _Hey, LaShawna, can I ask you something?_

 **LASHAWNA:** _Just this once, sure ; )_

 **HEATHER:** _You totally saw through me, right?  
I mean. You're not a stupid person.  
You had me figured out come season 2. You knew what I was about.  
Right?_

 **LASHAWNA:** _Oh yeah, for sure. It wasn't hard, either._

 **HEATHER:** :| _…. Yeah. I sort of assumed so.  
So then, you never tried to help me purely because you didn't think the end result would be worth it, right?  
You knew all I needed was someone to try to understand me, and you understood, but you didn't do anything just because I didn't seem worth helping.  
Right?_

 **LASHAWNA:** _Let's be honest here.  
If I came to you all open armed trying to help you, you wouldn't have let me. Maybe if it were someone else. Probably would've worked out better if someone you hardly knew came up to you trying to help, not someone you would talk to again._

I could remember reading that message, because the same emotions were stirring in me as I read it now. I remembered there was a flame of rage flickering in my chest and threatening to shoot out through my fingers, but I didn't let it. I took a deep breath, and refrained from saying something too ignorant.

 **HEATHER:** _I'll be sure to relay that to my therapist later._

 **LASHAWNA:** _Look, I'm just saying. If you had the option of venting to someone on the brink of elimination as opposed to someone who you knew would be stickin around for another week, you know you'd take the first option.  
You don't want that shit following you around. God forbid someone bring it up to you later._

My shoulders squared, anger heating my face a bit. I had enough faith in past-me to know I didn't react positively to that (and I didn't).

 **HEATHER:** _Ok like I'm trying not to get pissy here but that really rubbed me the wrong way.  
That's pure assumption. You don't know that. And in fact, you're pretty much wrong. Maybe you'd know that had you ever given me half a chance._

 **LASHAWNA:** _Don't ask me questions if you don't wanna hear my input. Simple as that. : )_

Oh god. Did I end up getting in a huge fight with LaShawna? Is.. _that_ what sparked my breakdown? That didn't exactly sound right. But, in my memory-compromised state, i couldn't remember what the hell happened. I continued scrolling through the messages like a really interesting book.

 **HEATHER:** _Ok. I just want you to know you're wrong. & I'm a little surprised that with you being the "nurturing" one you never even tried to lend a hand to me.  
Even Harold _tried.

 **LASHAWNA:** _Heather, you and I drove each other CRAZY and you know that. Looking back now, I still can't find a time where I could reached out to you and it would've ended well._

 **HEATHER:** _You're completely assuming how I would've reacted though. Sierra and I also drove one another crazy but look at us now! I can truthfully say she knows most of my secrets & not just because she wrote the book on stalking.  
I get that all this shit is in the past, and I don't blame you ALONE for this, but I'm just saying,  
Had someone tried to reach out to me before I hit the point of no return_

 _I wouldn't be like this._

 _And I'd give anything to not be like this._

 **LASHAWNA:** _You act like I knew you'd end up so bent outta shape.  
And the relationships between you and Sierra and you and me are completely different. You two had upsides during the competition. We didn't. The only reason we get along now is because no one's holding a millions dollars in front of our noses._

 **HEATHER:** _I'm not even talking about right now, lol. season 2 was the lowest point in my life. even now doesn't top that. I DIDN'T EVEN HAVE HAIR_  
 **HEATHER:** _like, I know this is petty as fuck, but you self-proclaimed "know your way around a weave" and didn't help me w/ that either like  
ik I was a bitch but don't act like the only reason you never reached out to me was bc of me.  
it was bc you DIDN'T WANT TO.  
period._  
 **HEATHER:** _you didn't want to.  
fair enough. but fess up at least._

 **LASHAWNA:** _I already tried a time or two in season one and all I got were stares, hun. What would be the point of trying again when I already got nowhere?_

 **HEATHER:** _Ok then. I'm not gonna argue this anymore. There's a lot I could say, but you're just going to keep insisting you're 100% in the right and have never made a single mistake. So ok._

 _Thanks for knocking my tooth out_ _though. Got me $600._

 **LASHAWNA:** _My pleasure. I'd do it again._

The email thread ended there, and I felt sick to my stomach after reading it. I could remember at least a bit of that conversation taking place, but it still didn't answer the question of why I was sitting in a hospital bed with a concussion.

The conversation left a terrible taste in my mouth, and I scrolled to the second of three.

Cody.

 **HEATHER:** _Hey Cody. Sure Sierra's gotten to you, but this is role call.  
You're coming, right?  
-ℋ_

 **CODY:** _Oh, yeah i'll be there. Like sierra would let me skip out, not that I would._

 **HEATHER:** _I'm starting to question whether this is even a good idea, but I'm in too deep to cancel. :L  
Had myself fooled I guess. I thought that everything would be... Nice and free and everyone would get along!  
... I don't really know why I thought that now, though. I guess I listened too much to Sierra._

 **CODY:** _I'm sure it'll be better when we actually get there. Planning things like this is always stressful._

 **HEATHER:** _I guess. But most of these people I've barely spoken three words to, and the one's I haven't...  
I don't know! I expected all of the game shit to magically be behind us. But not only is it not behind the rest of you, it's not even behind me! Even though I totally thought it was. Is that weird? To not know you're upset about something until... All of a sudden you're upset and you're like, "Shit, I didn't plan on this!"_

 **CODY:** _I mean I think I can understand that, even though im pretty quick to forgive. who knows? maybe if i saw duncan across the room from me right now id still be mad, but right now i can pretty safely say im not._

 **HEATHER:** _I thought the same thing. I didn't really think I was mad at LaShawna anymore until we started talking. And there was this big argument and I don't want it to mess the trip up but... I'm just so ANGRY at her!  
I'm ANGRY and I know I should just suck it up and deal with it but... I really, really feel like she owes me an apology. And I know she doesn't think she owes me shit. And that just gets under my skin so much!_

 **CODY:** _i dont know... anything that happened in the competition is kind of iffy, dont you think? I'm not picking sides, believe me haha,,, but its just,,, Everyone was really distracted and not in their own head for the most part. we are all playing a game and in that kind of place, maybe its just for the best that we dont take things personally.  
if she didnt act like she owed you anything, maybe the game is behind HER  
just a thought. i wouldnt take much of my word ^-^;;;;;_

 **HEATHER:** _I don't know! I apologized to her for being a cunt! I just expected an apology back!  
...Or well. I kind of apologized. Maybe it wasn't the most genuine thing ever but I acknowledged that I've done her wrong! And that's all I was asking of her!  
"Sorry I didn't help you when I could've."  
that's it.  
not asking her to kiss the fucking ring, damn._

 **CODY:** _that doesnt really sound like her.. did you really apologize? that "kind of" is suspicious_

 **HEATHER:** _I mean.. I think so? I at least implied it!_

 **CODY:** _heather... :/..._

 **HEATHER:** _listen. I swear I did. I recognized that I was a bitch, can't she just ALSO recognize that she's a bitch?!_

 **CODY:** _thats like... the opposite formatting of an apology  
its more like... "i was a bitch, and im sorry about that"  
just the first part is venting... maybe? probably. maybe its gloating,,,,?_

 **HEATHER:** _Bottom line is, I recognized that I've been bad to her, but she didn't do the same and just acted like she never did anything less than saintly in her life._

 **CODY:** _i think you need to try it again, heather_

 **HEATHER:** _…  
_ **HEATHER:** _You just hate me. That's what this is, isn't it.  
_ **HEATHER:** _You value your hamsters naps more than me and this is your way of showing me._

 **CODY:** _hey, i put my hamster away to talk to you this time! X)  
_ **CODY:** _look,,, i really think you should sit down and use the "s" word this time_

 **HEATHER:** _Ugh. Fine. But only cause you put your hamster away for me._

 **CODY:** _good luck! : D_

End of conversation.

I took a deep breath and glanced at the time on my phone. My parents would probably be back with food soon. And I still wasn't any closer to remembering what the hell happened to me.

But, I guess whatever sparked my "episode" wouldn't have happened yet. It would've been one of the last things sent, if it had had anything to do with the emails at all.

I still had one more thread to read, and with any luck, it'd hold my answer.

Another string of messages to LaShawna.

 **HEATHER:** _I'm sorry.  
I did horrible things, not just to you, and my compromised mental state doesn't undo that. Nothing undoes that, and nothing excuses it. I was a bitch. With a capital B. And I used people and hurt people and did a lot of shit with the direct intent of hurting You specifically.  
And I want to put it all behind us but pretending it didn't happen is lying. It happened. Let's accept it, not deny it.  
I'm sorry.  
-ℋ_

 **LASHAWNA:** _Consider it all water under the bridge... Lord knows I haven't been the best to you. Hell, I knocked a tooth straight outta your mouth.  
I should've said something, you were right. I'm sorry. I knew you weren't doing well and I really should've done something about it. At least tried, ya know? I think we were both bitches with capital B's.  
We can move on past this now, yeah? Try again... Try to get along?  
Because I'd like that a lot. : )_

 **HEATHER:** _… I know this is maybe weird timing to ask this question, but I don't want to leave any stone unturned. Have you heard anything of Alejandro since the game ended? Anything at all?_

 **LASHAWNA:** _Sorry girl, can't say I have. Never even heard his name since the end of the competition. I thought you woulda been all over his contact info._

 **HEATHER:** _... I've tried. No one knows anything about where he is. Not even Sierra.  
It's... probably for the best though. He wouldn't want to hear from me after what happened._

 **LASHAWNA:** _Are you crazy? You have me laughing over here, for real. That boy looked at you in a way he didn't look at anybody else.  
Me and Gwen were watching the season again online and man, it is clear as day, he wanted nothing to do with anyone else in that competition._

 **HEATHER:** _Hhhh…  
I know you mean well, but that just makes me feel guilty._

 **LASHAWNA:** _Guilty? I don't understand why._

 **HEATHER:** _Were you not watching when I kicked him off a volcano and had him burnt to a crisp or..._

 **LASHAWNA:** _Damn, honestly forgot that for a sec. My bad.  
Look, the pushing him down the volcano was all to win the game. The lava thing wasn't even your fault. He got pushed down by a group of people, and you weren't even IN that group._

 **HEATHER:** _He got pushed down? I haven't exactly rewatched that one._

 **LASHAWNA:** _Sure did! You ran around him with Chris and everyone else shoved his face into the dirt._

Following that message was a link to a video.

To the last five minutes of the Season 3 Finale.

My stomach started churning, and suddenly everything made sense.

I knew what sent me into my episode, now.

I had seen what Alejandro looked like after the lava hit him.

-ℋ

* * *

 **{ Author's Note:  
I apologize for how long this chapter was, and for all of the dialouge that came with it! I hope it wasn't too boring for you guys :). This story is wrapping up soon enough, and, honestly, a sequel may come, because I'm tempted to write all the way up to the start of All Stars.  
Let me know what you think and if you liked, please follow & review. :)  
** _ **-ℋ }**_


	8. Part 8

**June 30th, 2011**

Home sweet… awkward.. empty… home…

Tonight's 3 AM. Total Drama rerun was Niagra Brawls.

I don't usually watch the rerun when it's airing from season 3, because it still feels too close, too much like it all just happened yesterday - but Niagra Falls had actually been, for the most part, a positive experience, and it made me kind of happy to remember, so I watched it.

As the opening theme ran, I tried to recall where on the timeline this episode landed, and busted a gut when I recalled me and the Amazons building Gwen's face out of wood and steel the week before this one. I texted Cody about that and gathered some junk food. He responded with an embarrassed groan, which made me wonder if he and Gwen - or Duncan - still spoke. I didn't ask though. Once is already too many times to text somebody at 3 AM.

Watching the episode play was really surreal, because I felt really aware the entire time that… This was a real, actual day in my life. Exactly 85 days ago from today. 85 days ago I was in Niagra Brawls and Alejandro was carrying me across a tightrope in a wedding dress.

Wednesday, April 20th, 2011. ….Three months ago.

 _What. The. Fuck._

Aside from the regular culture shock that comes with realizing my life is, in fact, my literal life, and not some kind of weird fever dream, watching Niagra Brawls made me think about something I haven't in a long while.

Maybe it's useless to analyze a relationship that is already DOA, but I still wanted my thoughts about this on paper.

Around this period in the competition, and _especially_ in this specific episode, I was all over Alejandro. Like, embarrassingly all over Alejandro. If, in this tiny time period, he'd tried to work some kind of charm on me, it would've worked hands-down. But he didn't.

The thing that made Alejandro and I's relationship so complicated over the span of the season was that we were like… Parallel bars. Always

We always stayed this far apart. | |  
And sometimes he'd lean towards me / |  
But when he did, I would lean away from him. / /  
And starting at about "Slap slap revolution", that's how we were.

And then, right around Niagra Brawls, I started to lean towards him, and there was a moment, a tiny moment when he talked to me in the storage unit and we nearly kissed, that we almost _almost_ crossed. | \

But immediately, Alejandro leaned away from me. And we were parallel again. \ \

And that wasn't intentional. I know it wasn't. It was bad timing, it was me focusing on Alejandro the SECOND he stopped focusing on me and started dedicating himself 100% to his game strategy - that was GLARINGLY clear when I watched the episode, with his confessional sessions and all.

I just think it's sort of… Sad and romantic.

That we spent so much time perfectly parallel, in a tick-tock clock motion of…

| | / / | | \ \ | |

Had we ever leaned in at the same time, and crossed into an X, things could've been so passionate, so _right,_

But that's not how it happened.

-ℋ

 **July 1st, 2011**

 **SIERRA:** _Checked into the emergency room after a psychotic episode…_

 **HEATHER:** _I never said psychotic. .-._

 **SIERRA:** _Ya, I know, but I am! Geesh, and in TDWT I was referred to as the crazy one._

 **HEATHER:** _Thanks so much for the overwhelming support, bestie. I'm tearing up with gratitude, I can't believe how incredibly sweet and understanding you're being right now._

 **SIERRA:** _You know, your sarcastic "bestie"s are harmful sometimes. x) :P_

 **HEATHER:** _Out of that entire sentence, "bestie" was the only word that_ wasn't _sarcastic._

 **SIERRA:** _GASP!_

 **HEATHER:** _What._

 **SIERRA:** _HEATHER, THE MIGHTLY TOTAL DRAMA ICE QUEEN, HAS GENUINELY REFERRED TO SOMEONE AS HER FRIEND?_

 **HEATHER:** _Omg. Shut up. I've called you my friend before._

 **SIERRA:** _:? Maybe you have, but if you did it wasn't to my face! Awww Heather have you been telling other people we're besties? How sweet!_

 **HEATHER:** _I'm suddenly regretting this conversation…_

 **SIERRA:** _OMG I THOUGHT BECAUSE YOU DIDN'T WANT ME TO POST ABOUT YOU ON MY BLOG THAT YOU DIDN'T WANT PEOPLE TO KNOW WE WERE TALKING. THIS CONVERSATION IS GOING STRAIGHT ONTO MY #HEATHERRA PAGE YOU CAN'T EVEN STOP ME_

 **HEATHER:** _PLEASE TELL ME THAT'S NOT AN ACTUAL PAGE ON YOUR GODFORSAKEN BLOG_

 **HEATHER:** _…. OR AT LEAST CUT THE WORDS "PSYCHOTIC EPISODE" OUT BEFORE YOU POST IT_

Probably the weirdest side effect of me and Sierra becoming close is that I've started blogging. Not exactly _Sierra-level_ blogging, but… I'm beginning to see the appeal. I made one for the sake of following her shit and making sure she didn't go flashing my private information to the world, but I… kind of ended up running a page on which I flash private information to the world _myself._

Weird.

But it's a much easier way to keep in contact with everyone, rather than an endless string of emails and emails and emails, and it's easier to make big plans with everybody, and… I don't know. When I post pictures of the campsite we'll be staying on and I get a good 20 'likes' from the people that are coming, it makes me feel kind of… popular.

That was so lame.

That's why I have this diary for the things too lame for the internet to see. Thank god people on the internet are NEVER going to read this!

The camping trip is getting ridiculously close. Only about a week and a half until the big day, and me and Sierra are getting pretty pumped. I'm still a little nervous about seeing her in person, because I don't really know how to act around someone that's supposed to be my _friend,_ but… It's hard not to be excited.

The people definitely coming at this point are: Me, Sierra, Cody, LeShawna, Harold, Justin, Katie, Sadie, Beth, Duncan, Lindsay, Tyler, Owen, Noah, and DJ.

That's not exactly _everyone,_ but it feels like a pretty good turn-out to me.

Some people were just uncontactable, like Izzy and Eva. We tried, but never managed to get a connect.

Courtney gave us a flat out "HA HA, NO." Which... Was unsurprising. Sierra tried to coax her to no avail.

Gwen really, really wanted to come, but couldn't get out of work. I'm a little disappointed, just because I was hoping for more of a Team Amazon reunion than just Me, Sierra and Cody, but we promised her we'd skype her in after 6. She wants to be there "in spirit", which is fine by me.

Other people just had their reasons for being unable to make it. Geoff and Bridgette are still busy with work, still Fresh TV's pack mules. Trent's in college (and probably didn't truly want to come anyway). Ezekiel is… You know.

And Alejandro is gone.

Everything is really.. coming together. And I feel kind of _special_ almost, that I put this all together and that all of these people are coming together because of me.

The effect of it all is almost… _magical._

(Wow do I sound stupid. Glad again that no one else is ever going to read this.)

I've got therapy later on, and then the next week of my life feels… Really packed.

I may not write again until after the trip has happened… And no doubt I'll have a lot to say. Let's hope it's good stuff. … And that I won't have any more "episodes" to report.

I still don't really know what to think about that. I've tried to write about how I feel about it a few times now but.. The thing is, I don't really know how I feel about it. When I think about it too hard, I feel in danger of it happening again. So I'm just.. trying to focus really hard on this trip. Because when I think about Alejandro, things start to get bleak. Alejandro and his.. his skin all… and his legs were…

I've got to go.

-ℋ


	9. Part 9

**{ Author's Note:  
This is the final chapter of Heather's Lament. I want to thank you all so much for having followed this story through to the end, and reviews mean the absolute world to me. I hope you loved it as much as me!  
A sequel to this story will be starting before long - So if you want to see Heather all the way to All Stars, be sure to follow my profile, so you'll be notified when it's posted!  
Thank you again for reading - You're all awesome.  
-ℋ }**

* * *

 **July 18th, 2011**

Saturday was absolutely scorching - which was exactly why we planned for everyone to arrive around three, when the air would be nice and lukewarm and might even call for a fire.

At noon, though, it was starting to heat up, and I was jittering at the airport with a coffee in my hand. Sierra caught a relatively early flight so we could go to the campsite together and set up before having to run around picking up everybody else. I was already bugging about how stressful rounding everybody up from different gates and airports was going to be, and a knot was tying in my stomach at the thought that Sierra would be walking out that hall any second now.

"Why so nervous, Heathen? You've met Sierra before."

I snickered a bit and leaned back, drinking from the coffee again. "Yeah, I've met Sierra-who-hated-me before. This is totally different. What if she hugs me or something? I don't know how to hug. I haven't been trained."

He laughed and leaned over me. "We can practice right here right now, c'mere!"  
 _"NOOO DAD DON'T TOUCH ME!"_

We started wrestling over the chair while I fought his impending hug, and the battle over my personal space wasn't compromised until we realized we were being photographed.

Sierra was standing unceremoniously to our left, snapping phone pictures like she was a paparazzi service. I looked up at her and she waved like it was completely casual. And I guess it was.

I hugged her. Then my dad hugged both of us. And it was a lot easier than I thought.

The van was totally packed with stuff. I explained to Sierra that we needed to unload all of it at the campsite so we'd have enough room for everybody later in the day.

"Oh my goodness! This is a whole lot bigger in person than it looked on the computer!" Sierra exclaimed, hopping out of the car and looking around with her arms extended, like that was somehow helping her gauge the square-footage.

"Well it cost a pretty penny to rent out…" my dad commented, lugging a collapsable table from the trunk. I rolled my eyes at him for being lame and rushed to Sierra's side again.

"Are you at all.. Like… Nervous to see everyone?" I asked quietly.

"Uh, _no?"_ she responded like that was a completely ridiculous notion. "They're our friends! Why would I be nervous?"

I grew a bit hot in the face and turned, retrieving two packages of plastic cups and paper plates from the front seat. "Our friends? Some of them you've never even met before! Like the people who only competed on Season one?"

She snickered and dangled her phone like a plaything. "I still know everything about them thoooouuuugh!"

"More than I know about them, probably…" I snickered back, and she slammed into me with such great force I almost toppled over. She hugged me close to her side and rubbed my shoulder.

"It's going to be fiiiiineee! You need to stop worrying that people are gonna come out of the airport gate, see you, and be like, HOLY CRAP, HEATHER, MY MORTAL ENEMY, I MUST SLAY YOU NOW, and like, retrieve a samurai sword and plunge it directly into your chest! It's _nawt_ gonna happen girl, I swear."

I laughed at the visual, trying to pull out of her forced hug to no avail. "You don't understand! _That could actually happen with Harold!"_

Then _she_ laughed. So hard that she snorted, which I totally forgot she did. "You've _gawt_ to calm down, child," she cooed, and cut me off before I could question her using of the world _child._ "This is gonna be soooo much fun! Don't psyche yourself out! Everyone's excited to see _you specifically,_ otherwise they wouldn't have accepted the invite! You don't go to parties hosted by people you hate!"

I finally pulled away from her and walked the bags of cups and plates to the table my dad had unloaded. "First of all, this is not a _party."_ I insisted. She pointed matter-of-factly to the sixty or so red solo cups and I bit my lip, somewhat defeated. "... Point made," I muttered, "but still. You're not nervous about seeing _anyone?_ Not even Cody!"

"Not at all!" she exclaimed chipperly. "Me and Cody are actually well on our way to married-ville! _EEEEEEE!"  
"Pfffft!" _  
"No! Oh-em-gee I'm _serious!_ Look at this conversation we had yesterday!"

Pretty much for the next two and a half hours Sierra and I read past text messages from Cody and tried to decypher boy-lingo while my dad did all of the unpacking and setting up.

He finished up with the huge tents, which probably weren't that easy to set up alone, and then stood, wiping his hands. He sarcastically thanked us for being such a _huge_ help, and we full-heartedly told him he was _very_ welcome, still hovering over Sierra's phone screen. (By the way, I deduced that Cody _did_ seem kind of seriously into her.)

"Well girls, we've got to get going again. Your other friend's flights are set to be in soon."

We both leaped up like we'd heard a gunshot. _"IT'S THREE ALREADY?"_

"Nearly! It's crazy how long you girls can go on about boys."

I blushed as I crawled back into the now-empty car, because I had never particularly thought myself to be the kind of girl that gushes about boys for _hours._ Sierra kind of turned me into that kind of girl when she was around, though. I wondered absentmindedly if Alejandro would still like me if he saw me gossiping with Sierra like a typical Lindsay-type.

Then I realized I was thinking about a boy again and stopped.

* * *

" _PAAARTTYY! WOOOH! WOOOH! THE WHOLE GANGS BACK TOGETHER!"_ Owen.

"Yeah, that's great and all, but… What made you think we were all gonna fit into this minivan?" DJ.

"I can ride in the trunk if you want." Harold.

"You may have to…" Dad.

"Uhm, I call shotgun! Crowded places make me sweat, and sweat causes skin cancer or something!" Justin.

"Ohhhmigawd, that's awful! I second Justin's request for shotgun!" Katie.

"Me too!" Sadie.

"I call roof." Duncan.

"That sounds really fun, actually! Let's _all_ ride on the roof!" Lindsay.

"With how accident prone your poor boy toy is? I don't think so girl." LeShawna.

"Hey! I'm not accident prone! I'm just.. Uh.. I'm…" Tyler.

"Me and Cody-Wody can share a seat!" Guess who.

I smacked a hand to my forehead for the sixth or seventh time since everyone grouped together. "We'll just have to make two rounds! One half of you get in, and the other half of you wait here with me."

"You sure you're okay with that?" My dad asked. I nodded.

"Who wants to wait around for the second pickup with me?"

"I will." came a deep, deadpan voice. … Noah. I glanced at him and felt a little nervous, remembering again what our last interaction had been. I felt really vulnerable suddenly, knowing he'd seen me cry.

"I'll wait too," Justin said, a glint in his eye. "The fresh air is good for my pores."

"Like your perfect pores _need_ any help!" exclaimed Sadie, and he struck a pose.

"Want me to stay with you?" Sierra asked, and I shook my head.

"No, I think you should stay with the first group because you know what's going on at the campsite. Just. Text me or something." My phone buzzed in my pocket. _"I didn't mean right this second, you dipshit!"_

"We'll stay here with Justin!" said Thing one and two.

" _Shocking."_ Justin muttered.

"Me and Lindsay will stick behind too." LeShawna said. "I think that's enough people to make it work."

"Yeah," my dad agreed, looking over everyone. "That sounds good. Everyone pile in!"

So Sierra, Cody, Harold, Beth, Duncan, Tyler, Owen and DJ piled in.

And me, Noah, Justin, Katie, Sadie, LeShawna, and Lindsay stuck behind.

I didn't realize exactly how awkward my group was until all the others had pulled away, blasting Duncan's music out the speakers. We were all silent until the car was far enough in the distance that we no longer heard Owen's persistent _"WOOOHS"_ , and then things felt a bit uncomfortable.

I glanced over my group, and for a moment, and they glanced at each other, and all of a sudden I was hit with a very strong wave of nostalgia… And started laughing.

"What's so funny?" Lindsay asked with a cocked head.

"This just… reminds me.." I paused to grin. "Like, right after Chris would split us into two teams, and we all looked at each other like _Fuck."_

They all busted into laughter, especially Noah, who must've found me especially funny.

"It's… _exactly_ like that, actually." Noah said.

"We should pick a team name," Sadie said. "And you text Sierra and tell them to pick one too!" Katie added.

"But they've got one more person than us!" LeShawna observed, and a couple of us nodded.

"That's alright," Noah commented. _"We can have Alejandro's ghost."_

I stiffened really, really hard suddenly.

And I got that same feeling I did before my "episode" before.

The whole group went silent.

"Really, really, _not_ funny." I said quietly.

LeShawna elbowed Noah and rushed to my side, rubbing my shoulder. "Hey! Alejandro is _fine_ Heather, the boy didn't just drop off the face of the Earth! C'mon, let me show you this thing I brought you…." She started fishing into one of her bags.

I untensed a little. "You.. brought me something?"

"Yeah. I felt bad about our little fight and thought it'd be nice to bring you a little gift…"

"If it's a wig, you're like a year and a half too late." I stated. She laughed and instead pulled out several disposable cameras. I blinked.

"Um, LeShawna, you're aware it's 2011, right?"

She rolled her eyes and offered one two me, which I took and looked over, cheap plastic and yellow wrapping and all. "Film cameras just feel more nostalgic for me. You can go get them printed instead of keeping them on your phone for a few months and deleting them. Besides, I thought you'd like to have keepsakes to show _Alejandro_ when you meet back up!" She drug out his name all fancy like and my stomach churned a little. "To show him what he missed out on, of course. What's the point of a party if you can't brag?"

"True. That." Justin.

I forced half a grin and spun the winder on top the camera. "That's really kind of you, LeShawna. But I'd.. kind of rather no one bring Alejandro up, if that's okay…"

" _Awwwww!"_ chimed Katie and Sadie, and I felt annoyed that they felt pity for me. I didn't want to be pitiable.

But I'd gone into the hospital the week before for an Alejandro-based _"episode."_ Of course I was pitiable.

"Come _on_ girl!" LeShawna urged. "You two are gonna cross paths again. Maybe it'll be a minute, but it'll happen. The two of you were made for each other."

"Yeah!" said Sadie.

"Definitely." Noah said flatly. "I didn't even like the guy, but, he was definitely head over heels for you."

"Mhm!" Lindsay chirped. "Absol _utely."_

"Wait, hold on…" Justin said, and we all stopped and looked at him. _"Who's Alejandro?"_

Despite the legitimacy of his question, everyone burst into laughter again without answering. Then Lindsay took the camera from my hands, clicked it once to test, then turned it to us.

"Everyone say _'Team Alejandro Is Really Really Really Really Hot!'_ "

Click.

* * *

3:40 PM, Everyone had finally met up together at the campsite, and everyone was unpacking their stuff.

" _Team Owen's Indigestion!"_ cheered the remaining nine in a much happier tone than "indigestion" should ever be said.

"Ohmygawd," I said, sounding something like Sierra. _"Why?"_

"Think about it.." Duncan shrugged. "Has anyone ever beaten it in a fight?"

That got half a smile from me, a laugh from Noah, and… a fart from Owen.

I raised the disposable camera and took the group shot, including a few victorious faces and one or two looks of disgust from the smell.

"Okay," I said, glancing over at the two gigantic tents my dad had set up, "How about Team Owen's Indigestion gets one tent, and the rest of us get the other?"

" _The rest of us?"_ Lindsay asked. "Are you _ashamed_ of our team name, Heather?"

I cringed, but was fighting a smile.

"Say it." Noah prompted. "Say it out loud."

"Whatever, Edward Cullen!" I toted, turning and crossing my arms. "He's… He's not all that…. all that… _hot_ anyway."

Everyone laughed, and my face burned red, but I couldn't help but smile. As the crowd teased me about being "in looooovvve", Cody raised an awkward hand. I eyed his formality a bit oddly, but asked what he wanted.

"I brought my own tent," he explained, gesturing to a bag beside the table. "I was kind of wanting Sierra and I to… sleep apart from everyone else?"

My eyes widened for a moment, and I actually looked around to see if anyone else heard that, but no one seemed to be phased. Oh my god, Sierra was right… Cody _is_ being kind of serious about her! She and I exchanged nervous, excited looks before I nodded at Cody. "That's.. fine. The sleeping arrangements aren't set in stone."

Things went pretty well for a few hours, everyone was goofing off and drinking this really bad punch I shouldn't have bought. By the time six rolled around, though, the sun was starting to go down and everyone was calming a bit.

We all crowded around the fire pit in the shade, and cliques found each other. The previous members of Team Victory (LeShawna, Harold, Lindsay and DJ) were in a quad and talking excitedly, with Tyler lingering around them to gawk at Lindsay. Justin was surrounded by his fans, Katie, Sadie, and Beth. Noah and Owen were doing… Whatever it is that boys do. Fart jokes or something.

My instinct was to go buddy up with Sierra again, but her and Cody were talking, and I had the thought that she'd much rather hang out with him than me.

Ugh. Great.

My worst nightmare about this camping trip was already coming true: I was _alone._

I dug my nails into my arm and was already having the thought that this whole thing was a huge mistake, when I saw.. Duncan. Looking just as alone as I was. And.. kind of bummed. He was off from the circle, sitting against a tree, and when we met eyes he waved me over.

I glanced around like maybe he'd been talking to someone else, but it was definitely me, so I walked over and had a seat beside him underneath the tree.

"Hey." he said.

"Hey." I said.

"... Remember when we had friends?" He asked. I snorted.

"No. No I do not."

He laughed and leaned back. "Remember when we were on the show and could pretend we had friends?"

" _That_ I remember." I laughed.

"... Wanna talk?" he asked, not looking at me or particularly facing me, just staring off at the others a bit away. I did the same, leaning with my back to the tree. The sun was still going down.

"Talk about what, exactly?" I asked.

"I dunno. I hear you aren't doing so good." he said. I tensed again.

"Who exactly did you hear that from?" I asked, half wondering if Sierra had posted some shit I'd told her not to on her blog.

He just snickered and didn't answer the question, instead saying "You know, I'm… not doing so great myself."

I blinked a few times and half wondered why he was telling me this. Not because I didn't want to know, but because me and Duncan weren't exactly BFF's. Then again, I wasn't exactly BFF's with _anyone_.

"Oh, uh, yeah?" I asked, swallowing. "... I've been in therapy since the season ended."

He sat up a little straighter. "Me too, actually."

"Oh…" My thoughts drifted to a lot of things right then, but I just watched Justin off in the distance trying to climb a tree for some reason while everyone laughed.

"Isn't it weird how like... We've been gone like three years. And that's just. Way too long to just return to normalcy like nothing happened."

My eyes widened a little and I looked at him, studied his face in the dying light for a moment. ".. Yeah…" I said. "Exactly. My mom doesn't seem to get that this show completely shaped me as a person."

" _Right?!"_ he exclaimed with a bit more vigor than I expected, and I stifled a half-hearted laugh. "... I was really hoping Gwen was going to be here." He said quietly after a moment.

I remembered it was past six and scanned the crowd for Sierra. "They're probably over there skyping her right now!" I said. "You can go over and see her if you want."

He didn't budge. He just let out a long sigh. And he looked very, very lonely.

"Me and Gwen are supposed to be, like, together, you know? But I've barely gotten three texts from her since the game ended. She's avoiding me to all hell and I don't know why. And she didn't come on this trip even though it'd be a chance for us to see each other again."

"I don't think that's _why_ she didn't come," I offered. "She told me she couldn't get out of work."

He ignored me and kept talking. "And obviously Courtney won't be calling me up any time soon because I fucked that up way beyond repair. She'll probably never speak to me again, much less pursue a friendship. And, again, she didn't come here, specifically to avoid me." His voice wavered with emotion for a moment before he quickly replaced the sadness with anger, hitting his fist against the ground beside me. "God! You know, I'm not sure _what_ it is about me that makes people _want_ to leave, but I'm starting to think it's just my whole entire _personality."_

Ouch. That last bit actually hit me through the heart.

This was… Unexpected, and maybe a little weird, but clearly Duncan was having some real problems right now. In addition, problems I could _actually relate to a lot._ It was time to put my Sierra-training to use and actually try the friend thing.

"Duncan…"

He turned and looked at me, and the scowl on his face masked a lot of hurt. It reminded me of… me.

"... The one time anyone _ever_ actually took the time to understand me enough to _be_ my friend, I shoved them away. I mean, literally shoved. Like, I shoved him off a volcano."

That won a small laugh from him.

"And… I know I'm never going to find him again. Literally, or, um, metaphorically. Because there's never going to be another Alejandro, you know? I feel like… That was my one and only shot at happiness, and I fucked it up, and that opportunity is never going to present itself to me. Like… I feel like shoving Alejandro off that volcano was the climax of _my entire life,_ and my whole life after that is just going to be like… Coping with the fact that he's gone."

His eyebrows curved up with sympathy, and he nervously toyed with his lip ring. "What about… Sierra? You're close with her, aren't you?"

I swallowed, glancing out again. "She doesn't even notice I'm gone. Sierra has a million friends. I'm just one. Not even a particularly special one. I mean, she'd leave me for Cody in a heartbeat. Fuck, she'd leave me for a rock that's shaped a little bit like _Cody's head_ in a heartbeat."

He nodded slowly and leaned his head back against the tree again.

"... And everyone keeps telling me that I need to keep faith or whatever, that he's going to be back. But the thing is… I know he's not. Even if we ever do meet again, he's not going to want anything to do with me. He has every reason to hate me."

"I know that feeling…" he said, and I knew he was thinking of Courtney.

"And just… I feel bad about it, because I know everyone's trying to help, but their words just feel so empty. It's not gonna get better. It's not."

"At least people try to reassure _you!"_ Duncan insisted. "When I talk about the two people I've _ever_ cared about wanting nothing to do with me, people just _agree!"_ I laughed a bit and he squinted at me. "Or, you know, call me a fucking pussy or something."

I pretended to think hard on that. "Hmm… I think you are being kind of a pussy," I teased.

"Aw man! C'mon, what about you, huh? Over here reading like a damn open book? Who are you and what have you done with Heather?"

I laughed so hard my sides started to hurt. "Maybe we're both going soft."

"God I hope not!" he exclaimed, throwing his hands up. "My only appeal is in my rugged bad-boy exterior!"

"Are you sure about that? I, personally, could live without it." I was gripping my stomach at this point - his over reactions were pretty funny.

He put on an offended face. "What!? Come on, Heather, that's the only thing I have going for me!"

"I don't know about that," I said, calming down. "I think I prefer open-Duncan."

"Even if he's a pussy?"

"Mhm."

We were looking right at each other then, and there was just enough light still seeping through the trees for us to see each other. Our eyes didn't leave one another's, and slowly, he started to lean towards me.

My breath caught in my chest. And then I leaned in, just a little. My skin prickled and I felt a pressure building in my stomach, and suddenly we were close enough for me to feel the warmth radiating from his skin.

But I didn't kiss him.

I couldn't.

I pulled away completely, turning off away from the view of the campsite and letting my hair fall into my face to shroud me. My shoulders shook slightly with my trembling breath. I heard Duncan behind me let out a slow, soft sigh.

"... Is… Is it Alejandro?" he asked.

I squeezed my eyes shut as tight as I could and I nodded.

He put a hand on my back. Then I turned, and hugged him. And he hugged me too.

I hugged him especially tight.

Then we both got up together and returned to the others.

* * *

"What would you have done differently?"

The fire crackled.

"I would've been kinder. More considerate." Cody.

"I would've just plain never come at all." DJ.

"I would've been…. More selective with my trust…" Lindsay said, and everyone looked at me. I smirked and looked almost proud.  
"... Also I wouldn't have voted LeShawna off in Season one." Quiet laughter rumbled around the circle.

"I would have been nicer to my best friend. Instead of trying to pull her down all the time." Katie. Sadie pulled an arm around her.  
"Me too. Some things are more important."

"I would've tried harder and cared less about what people thought of me, especially in season one." Beth.

"Not befriended Owen." Noah.  
"Heeeyyyy…"  
"Okay fine. I guess I maybe would've shown a little more initiative."

"I'm not sure there's anything I would've done different." Sierra.  
"Me neither!" Owen.

"I'm with DJ. I'd go back in time and stop myself from ever auditioning." Duncan.

"I think I could've stood to be a bit more independant. And, like, stood up for myself?" Harold. "Also I wouldn't have voted off LeShawna in season one."

"I'd have tried harder to serve as a good role model instead of a bad one." LeShawna.

"I don't know. I guess I'm just glad I had the opportunity." Tyler.

"I guess I would've talked more? I don't know, I feel like that's a cop out." Justin.

Everyone looked to me, then. I was the only one who hadn't answered.

"I would've…"

 _What_ _ **wouldn't**_ _I have done different?_

 _I should've been kinder. Nicer. Tried to open up more. Focused less. Appreciated the things that would inevitably end._

 _Not kicked Alejandro off that fucking volcano._

 _Kissed him while I still had the chance._

" **I would've won the million dollars."**

Everyone laughed. _"Me too!"_ came a chorus of voices.

"I'd like to change my answer to that," commented Noah.

I grinned and leaned nearer to Sierra, who was sitting at my right.

And I felt, at the moment, like I was surrounded by friends.

* * *

We played truth or dare for _hours_ until people were starting to fall asleep.  
(Justin lost three articles of clothing for refusing to complete dares that might damage his hair, Lindsay and Katie kissed, Noah was dared to spend half the game on my lap, Tyler had to down the entire remaining bowl of horrible punch in one go, LeShawna lost her shirt, Cody admitted to editing abs onto his facebook pictures, Sierra licked _so. many. things,_ and we got pictures of _everything._ )

By the time midnight had rolled around, everyone had sorted into their respective team tents (except for Sierra and Cody, who were in their single doing.. _whatever.)_

I couldn't sleep, though. How could I, everything considered?

I was sort of thinking about things that should've been really far from my mind. Like the fact that I'm really really bent in the head nowadays.

Bent enough that Sierra didn't understand my "episode". Bent enough that I felt isolated around everyone but Duncan, who is pretty _bent_ now himself.

Not to say I wasn't having an amazing time. I was! I was blending in with everyone like we were just a big group of friends, but at the same time… I wasn't.

World Tour changed me in a way I don't think it changed a lot of people.

I was half wishing Duncan was in my tent so I could talk to him again when my thoughts were interrupted by a voice.

"Hey… Heather… Are you still up?"

I shifted in my sleeping bag, squinting against the bright light omitting from their phone screen.

"Mhm. Is anyone else?" I turned over to see Noah sitting in the corner, scrolling through Buzzfeed or something.

"Nope. I'm pretty sure everyone else is out. Which means we beat Team Owens Indigestion."

I sat up, the corners of my mouth turning up somewhat. "So you wanna go draw on the other team?" A previously established plan between all members of Team Alejandro Is Really Really Really… _whatever._

He smirked. "Well, I'm not saying we should do it, I'm just saying it'd be incredibly disappointing if we didn't do it."

I laughed and went for the paint markers (and one of the disposable cameras we hadn't filled yet) buried beneath other countless supplies we hadn't even used - glow sticks, crosswords, games. My dad had way over-prepared to make sure we'd all have something to do. Little did he know that Total Drama had taught us to have fun with nothing but a tree and most of Justin's clothes.

We tiptoed around our teammates and back out into the night, where the breeze was a little chilly but the air was mostly warm and baked.

"Okay," I said in a hushed tone. "What's the game plan? Are we going old school with the mustaches or are we gonna shoot straight to dicks?"

Noah chuckled, not doing much to keep his voice down. "Hey, let your morals lie where they may. But Owen's getting dicked."

I gasped, like one of those completely enthralled gasps that meant I was totally excited to have gained dirt on somebody, and he turned a shade of burgundy that was noticeable even in the dark. "That sounded kind of.."

" _Don't. Mention. It."_

"You know, I thought it was kind of strange you were so apathetic about spending the night on my lap…"

" _Shut up. That's not what I meant."_

"Do you guys wanna make your way to Cody and Sierra's sex tent when they're done with it?"

" _EWWW?!"_

I started laughing, but then quickly quieted myself because I didn't want to wake up Team Owen's Indigestion.

"God," Noah muttered. "I don't even get a new one? You expect me to climb right into a _used_ dirty sex tent? Like some kind of animal?"

" _PfffhahahahahHAHAHAHAHA!"_

I gotta admit. The idea of Cody and Sierra's used sex tent was pretty disgusting. I made the decision right then that there was no way I was risking walking in there to draw dicks on either of their faces.

"So, if I provided you with a _new_ sex tent, a cleanly, disinfected sex tent, would Owen be -ahem - _getting dicked?"_

"Literally, don't make me barf."

I laughed again. "Who, then? Surely someone's on your mind. Mister quiet kid in the back pretending Buzzfeed doesn't suck."

"Hey, Buzzfeed is - How did you even…" He sighed. "What's it matter to you?"

"It doesn't." I said simply. "I was trying to be friendly by pretending to care about your life. Did it work?"

"Spectacularly." He rolled his eyes. "Actually, there is _someone-"_

"Did you not just hear me? I said I don't care."

He stared at me for a moment, like he couldn't decide if I was joking or not, before eventually deciding I was and laughing. I smirked.

"Me and… Somebody, kind of had a thing going for a while. But now I'm not so sure it's a thing anymore. I feel kind ignored I guess."

My eyes widened, because god damn it, I love gossip. "Oh my _gawsh,_ who?"

" _That,_ I'm not telling you."

"Oh come on! Is it someone here?" He turned away and didn't answer, which told me that it was. I cackled. "Oh my _gawd._ Is it someone on Team Owen's Indigestion? Because we can use the permanent markers on them if they're ignoring you. There's literally no way to remove them, I brought them just in case someone pissed me off."

He laughed. "Okay - First of all, _that's_ awesome, but no."

I paused. "Does that mean they're on _our_ team? Oh my _gawd_ , is it _LeShawna?"_

"As if. You know, I think this conversation is over now, let's go dick Owen."

He tried to walk forward, but I stopped him, stomping one of my clunky ass clogs into the ground like a child. "Come oooonnn! Is it… _me?"_ I joked, and struck a pose.

He was fighting a laugh again. I don't think I've ever seen Noah laugh so much before, unless I just wasn't paying attention. I wondered again if he just thinks I'm especially funny. I posed for too long and he yanked my arm down and told me to shut up.

"Okay. So if it's not LeShawna, and it's not me, and I know it's not Lindsay or Beth, then…"

I froze suddenly, remembering a particular page I'd seen on Sierra's ship blog once. I gasped.

" _IT'S JUSTIN!"_

" _SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!_ ALRIGHTY THEN THIS WAS FUN LET'S GO DO THE MARKER THING NOW THANKS HEATHER…"

"OH MY _GAWD."_

"Lower. Your. Voice."

"Man, Sierra's blog isn't complete nonsense after all…"

"I don't know if I'd go making jumps like _that._ "

I crossed my arms and thought for a moment. "You and Justin had a thing. Seriously?"

He crossed his arms too and looked embarrassed. "What, are you gonna fetch me a sex tent?"

I laughed. "Maybe."

"Listen, I realize who I'm talking to right now, but please don't say anything."

I acted fake shocked and offended. "Me? A gossip?"

"Please, Heather?"

"Fine. But on one condition."

"I'm shocked."

"You need to post publically that you think I am completely awesome and a good friend. And that my camping trip was totally amazing. And that my life is going totally great."

His lip twitched like he was trying not to laugh at me. Then he nodded. "Alright. Deal."

"Come on then," I said. "Let's go dick Owen."

* * *

For the record, we did dick Owen. We dicked him hard. I also wrote the word "PUSSY" on Duncan's forehead. Just in case he forgot that I'm awful.

Also, those paint markers that like, bubble? You know what I'm talking about? The gelly shit that middle school girls use to write on shirts? We left dabs of that like, _all over Beth's body,_ and honestly, she's probably still trying to wash it. We left poor DJ alone though, except for the word "VICTORY" down his arm in green bubbles, and "MOMMA" down the other.

Miraculously, we managed to wake no one, and tiptoed out of the Team Owen's Indigestion tent undetected. Before we could hide back into our own tent again, though, Noah stopped me.

"Hey Heather? I was wanting to talk to you about something."

I stopped and turned, expecting more Justin gossip. "What's up?"

"You remember that time… Like, four months ago on the train, when we were coming home?"

Any safety I'd been feeling around Noah before that moment was now rolling off my shoulders and into a shallow grave. I bristled.  
"No," I said, even though I could still see the look in his eyes when he saw me. How _shocked_ he looked to see me beaten down and vulnerable. "I don't know what you're talking about."

I tried to climb into the tent again, but he stopped me. "We were coming home from World Tour, and we were on the same train. But I didn't realize you were there."

I forced myself to swallow down some kind of emotion. "It's not like you would've done anything if you _did_ realize I was on the train."

"I… I mean I… I probably would've sat near you or something."

"Thanks?" I said, growing an edge. "I'm really not that comfortable with this conversation."

"I'm… I'm not trying to make you feel uncomfortable or anything, I just… Felt like we needed to talk about it."

"Why?" I asked harshly, stiffening further. I tried to stand up taller, like I could out-size him to intimidate him.

"Because you seemed really upset then, and I wanted to… apologize for not helping you? I guess?"

My face was turning red with anger and humiliation. "It wasn't like that, okay! Just because I cried one time doesn't mean I'm some weak pathetic little thing who has to result to talking to someone as irrelevant as _you!"_

He gained this expression on his face that I swear, burned into my retinas forever. It wasn't anger, or sadness, it was just… Disappointment. Not disappointment like he was disappointed in himself, but in _me._ Like he expected me to be better than this.

The worst thing about it was that I felt I'd seen that expression before. Thinking on it, I recalled it on Alejandro's face. And my father's. And I wanted to cry.

" _Weak and pathetic?"_ He repeated. "Heather, don't push your insecurities on me. Your use of those words has a lot more to do with how you think of yourself than how I think of you."

It was like he'd reached out and slapped me across the face. I didn't know what to do, because I couldn't run into the tent. So instead, I ran towards the woods, away from the clearing until I found a stupid stump away from everything and sat and bawled.

I felt so much self hatred in that moment it could've choked and killed me. I was remembering every time I'd seen that look before, that _"I thought you were something better than this"_ look.

The way Alejandro looked at me when I hurt his feelings. Like in Drumheller - twice - and when were standing over the lava. The visual reminded me of the burn I'd gotten up my leg, and I reached to touch it to find nothing there anymore. I dug my nails into the skin and hoped silently that Alejandro was just as healed.

I'd seen that look on my mom's face, too, when I'd been lying in the hospital bed, when I couldn't stop crying about the mangled, burnt body I'd seen on the screen. But I hadn't cared very much when I saw that look from my mom - it hurt so much more on the face of my dad,  
When I was younger and would get moody, or say that I hated him,  
Or when he would catch me in a lie,  
Or when I confided in him that I wanted to kill myself.

That's why I was sent to therapy in the first place. I remember that, then, and half wished I had my diary with me at that moment. That I could grip at the soft, smooth moleskine and wrap it to my chest, and twirl the little green ribbon around my finger like I did when I was anxious or scared.

I wondered if I still did want to kill myself. I thought about it, and wasn't completely sure.

Yes, but also no.

Kind of like, Yes, but not quite yet, I'll wait a little longer just in case things magically get better soon.

I wondered if Dr. Kenwar would give me that same disappointed look if I told him that.

I held my legs and kept crying until the pain between my ribs began to die down. Then I heard footsteps cracking sticks and leaves behind me, and I froze.

"Heather…?"

Sierra. I let out a breath. "Yeah…" I said quietly.

She came around the stump, looking terribly tired, followed closely by Cody. "Noah woke me up," she explained. "He said you were all upset."

I bit the inside of my cheek. "Sorry. I'm okay. You guys can go back to bed."

She shook her head with a warm, sleepy smile and sat beside me on the stump, placing a hand on my back and rubbing it gently. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," I said. "Just the usual shit I guess. You're used to it by now, huh?"

"Oh Heather…" she said sadly. "Tonight was supposed to be fun. You aren't supposed to be like this right now."

I couldn't help but hear that as _"Why can't you magically turn your mental illness off?"_ but I didn't comment on it.

"I have had fun," I said.

Cody sat down on the ground a bit in front of us, looking tired himself. Looking at him, I actually cheered up a little, because it reminded me of what he'd said during the finale - the moment I'd actually felt like I'd made someone kind of proud. And maybe I had made Cody proud. That didn't exactly level out - one account of making someone proud against a thousand and two accounts of disappointing people - but it still made me feel better right then.

I remembered that I had never gotten to truly thank him for that, and I felt the time was appropriate for whatever reason, so I said: "Hey Cody? You remember during the World Tour finale, right? When you were one of my helpers, and, you said that thing?"

He looked up and smiled a little. "What thing?"

"You said that I was the good guy. And I know that was a small thing, and maybe you don't even remember saying it, but… that really-"

I was cut off. "Oh. I mean, you and Alejandro were both bad guys, really. You were just like, the lesser of two evils. Because you didn't feed me to a shark."

I felt like my heart froze for a second. "... Oh."

He shrugged like he hadn't just taken something very important from me.

"I never called you the good guy. I just said you were… _not_ the bad guy."

I nodded slowly. I half expected Sierra to do something, but she didn't. Just kept rubbing my back.

"So you think… I…"

"Think what?"

Cody seemed completely oblivious to the tears burning in my eyes.

"Am I a bad person, completely?" I asked quietly.

He looked up like he had no idea what to say. Every second he hesitated felt like a knife in the heart.

"I… I… Heh, I don't really… I can't really answer that, Heather."

I folded in on myself and cried again. I mean, he was right, wasn't he? If even someone like Cody, who can see the good in pretty much anyone, couldn't see the good in me…

Surely it just plain _wasn't there,_ right?

No one said anything. I cried, and cried, and cried, and Sierra held me like I was four years old, and I clung onto her like she was the only thing I had. But she didn't say anything.

And I really, really wished she would've.

Cody sat silent too, picking at the grass and just looking uncomfortable. I realized that Cody must really dislike me for some reason, which was hurtful because I'd previously had a pretty high opinion of him. I felt sick to my stomach remembering the times we'd called or texted and knowing that he'd been annoyed by my presence the entire time.

That meant Sierra had lied, too, when she made excuses for why he didn't want to talk to me. Why hadn't I seen through that?

Why did I even care? Why did I care at all what that stupid brat had to say about me?

I didn't know. I still don't. I just let Sierra walk me back to camp.

To be honest, I laid in her arms the rest of the night, and she held me very tightly. And I took some solace in knowing she was staying another week, and that the next night might be something like this too.

* * *

I never did sleep. I knew my dad would be by to get everybody - or at least the first load - around eight AM so we could go back home for breakfast, but I heard somebody up and rummaging around the fire ring at 6:30 or so, so I wriggled my way out of Sierra's grasp and out of the single tent. I found Harold sitting on one of the logs by himself, blinking in the light. I walked over to one of the opposing seats and sat.

"Morning," I said softly.

"Mornin'," he replied, stretching. "Hey, you were the one who drew on everybody, didn't you?"

I snorted. _Oh my gawd. I totally forgot we did that._

"Well," he said, "Thank you for not drawing on _me._ I'm allergic to most paint."

I realized then that he hadn't lifted his shirt yet to see the message we'd left on his stomach. I gave a cheesy grin and cocked my head. "You're welcome, dude!"

"I'm wicked hungry," he said. "and I couldn't sleep very well with such a crowded tent."

"Sorry," I said. "Breakfast won't be for a few hours yet, but there's still snacks in the other tent if you need something to hold you over."

"Thanks." He got up and went to find something to eat, returning a minute later with, literally, an entire box of twinkies. He threw me one and I unwrapped it.

"Hey, uh, Harold?"

"Yup?"

"I know we don't really talk a lot exactly."

"You could say that."

I snickered. "I was just wondering if you still remembered…"

"That conversation we had on the kayak, right?"

"Yeah!" I smiled. "How'd you know?"

"I'm pretty much psychic."

I smiled again. Harold hadn't changed a tiny bit since the game, and something about that was weirdly comforting.

"I know that right after that I kind of, like, left you, but I still -"

He shushed me. "Don't worry about it. You were just being you. And I respect that."

I smiled again, but mostly because he was amusing me. "What exactly do you mean by that?"

"I mean that everybody has a different way of coping with the world. I'm not going to judge you for the way that you deal with things. That's just how you are. And that's cool. If everybody just accepted that everyone is the way they are, things would be a lot simpler."

I paused. "That was surprisingly competent of you," I smiled.

"For example," he started, "I cope through wicked bad-ass roleplay."

I sputtered and laughed. "To be honest, your coping method sounds _way_ funner than mine." I was grinning ear to ear, then. He stood.

"Come here. You need a hug. I can tell."

"Oh, I uh, I don't really do hugs…"

"Come here."

I complied, and I have to admit, the hug thing was getting easier. As we pulled away, I went out on a limb and asked the question that'd been itching my brain since the previous night.

"So, uh, you don't think I'm… You know. A _bad person?"_

"Not at all!" he replied. "I don't really believe in bad people. Everybody feels alone, and everybody's scared. And everyone deals with that fear differently, and that shouldn't be held against them, because honestly, being a human is kind of terrifying."

My face flushed, and I felt a whole lot better. I realized then that he sounded a lot like LeShawna, and the fact that she put up with him started to make more sense.

"Even if I did believe in the concept of bad people, I still don't think you would be one," he added.

"Thank you Harold… That makes me feel a lot better, actually… You make a lot of sense."

"Happy to help!" He sat back down and unwrapped another twinkie. I took a bite of my own.

"So," I said, "That's why you pretend to be a samurai? Because you're scared?"

"Well, that, and also samurai's are awesome."

I smiled, and then I heard Beth shriek from the tent because she'd woken up covered in bubbles.

* * *

My mom had made enough biscuits and gravy to account for fifteen people. What she hadn't accounted for was that Owen alone could take down enough biscuits and gravy for fifteen normal people.

But we made it work.

Everyone was seated around my very crowded kitchen table, laughing and telling stories from the previous night. My mom seemed to be surprised to realize I even had so many friends.

"You're all Heather's friends from that reality show?" she asked, just hardly peaking out of the kitchen.

"Oh yeah!" LeShawna said. "We go way back!"

"What, do you not recognize us?" Justin asked, seeming offended that someone might forget his beautiful face.

"Well, I.." My mom stuttered and seemed almost ashamed for a moment. "I never really watched the show…"

"What?!" Lindsay exclaimed. "Ohhh my gawd, we have so many stories about Heather we could tell you!

"IIIIII don't really think that's necessary!" I chirped, and Owen laughed.

"Oh no, it's too late for that!" LeShawna said. "Rachel - that's your name, right ma'am? Have a seat, let me tell you a thing or two about your daughter."

For at least an hour, we all recounted tales from the past three years of Total Drama, and I laughed so hard I was crying several times. The best part was probably Duncan telling about the time Gwen and I had tricked him and Owen into trusting us and we stole all of their supplies, in the survival challenge in TDI. I was literally gasping for breath - _and so was my mom._

My mom was actually learning things about who I was - who I _am,_ and, looking at her talk with my friends and ask questions about me, I started to feel like maybe the relationship was salvageable after all.

I sat around the table eating breakfast and feeling generally very at ease. Harold's words were still ringing in my ears, and, at least for a little while, I felt like I was doing pretty good. I still do.

Things aren't going to be easy.

They never have been, and they never will be.

But _I'm going to make it._

Maybe I'll never find Alejandro. Maybe I'll never get to tell him I love him.

Maybe I will, and he'll reject me.

Maybe there will be other Alejandro's.

Maybe there will be other Cody's, who just won't like me.

Maybe there will be other Dr. Kenwar's, who I won't be able to understand.

Maybe I'll end up rich and famous in a mansion one day.

Maybe I won't.

Maybe I'll go back to Total Drama one day.

Maybe I'll never see a TV set ever again.

Maybe Sierra and I will be friends for the rest of our lives.

Maybe we'll drift and never speak again.

Maybe there will be other Sierra's, too.

The mystery is kind of… intriguing.

I've always tried really, really hard to shape my own life. To change my life instead of letting my life change me. But right now, I think it's best for me to be passive.

To just let life happen to me.

After all, life _happens_ to everybody. And the way we react to it - that's how we determine who we are as people.

And I'm fucking Heather Suoh.

No matter what life has in store for me…

I kind of think I'm gonna be alright.

 _ **-ℋ**_

* * *

End.


End file.
